Holly Boffy, a teacher turned politician has now come to the conclusion that the current discontent among teachers is really just a small minority disturbance caused by the "teacher unions". What a ridiculous politically motivated whine! I hope my readers can take the time to read the top story in The Education Week Teacher section this week. It is an account of the evaluation experience that the teachers in Louisiana will soon be subjected to. This Florida teacher likens her experience to Dante's rings of hell. Please read also the blog this week by Dianne Ravitch. She has some pointed remarks about what is now happening in Louisiana.
Ms Boffy is wrong! She has sold her soul to the non-educator "reformers" who would have the public believe that the under performance of many Louisiana students should be totally and permanently placed upon the shoulders of teachers. These reformers like White and Jindal talk about honoring and "empowering" teachers while they systematically dismantle both the profession and the public schools our children depend upon. The unions had nothing to do with these false charges against teachers. The unions had nothing to do with the claim that the present evaluation system does not rate enough teachers is unsatisfactory. The fact that one third of our students in Louisiana are performing below grade level is used as justification by the reformers that the new evaluation system must classify at least 10% of all teachers as "ineffective" each year. This is not an evaluation system, it is a purge designed to rid Louisiana of the imagined incompetent, lazy teachers that are holding our students back.
How will Ms Boffy and the other reformers feel when several years from now after many good teachers' careers have been destroyed, and the student scores will not have changed significantly? How will they feel when the voucher students and the charter students still continue to perform below grade level? How would they feel if a system labeled one of their own children as "below average"? Surely it must still be the teacher's fault! Just fire this batch and get some new ones. Mark Twain once said "Tis sad but true, that half the American citizens are below average." In the heat of the education reform movement we have created a Lake Wobegon Effect where all of the children are supposed to be above average or by golly the teachers will pay!
I do not believe the average members of the public believe teachers are to blame for all the ills of society. But I also believe that the general public will not respect teachers if the teachers do not respect themselves enough to fight for their profession.
Please for the sake of the teaching profession, do not let this scare tactic about teacher unions or the "good teachers" verses the "bad teachers" distract you from fighting back. Please contact your legislators over and over again if necessary and plan on participating in the protest at the Capitol on April 4.
Thursday, March 29, 2012
Wednesday, March 28, 2012
Please Contact Senators
The phone number for the Senate switchboard is 225-342-2040. Please telephone your senator to ask that he/she oppose the Governor's legislative package. If you cannot get through to your senator leave a message asking him/her to oppose HB 974, HB 976, SB 603, and SB 597. Have you filled out the Senate Protest slip provided for you at the LAE website? It's easy to do. Just go to http://www.lae.org/.
PLEASE START NOW TO MAKE PLANS TO ATTEND THIS MAJOR PUSH TO DEFEAT THE LEGISLATION THAT EDUCATORS BELIEVE WILL DO IRREPARABLE HARM TO PUBLIC EDUCATION!
Please check this blog regularly for updates on the legislation and for more details on the mass protest planned for April 4.
MASS EDUCATOR AND PARENT PROTEST PLANNED FOR APRIL 4 AT THE CAPITOL
PLEASE START NOW TO MAKE PLANS TO ATTEND THIS MAJOR PUSH TO DEFEAT THE LEGISLATION THAT EDUCATORS BELIEVE WILL DO IRREPARABLE HARM TO PUBLIC EDUCATION!
Please check this blog regularly for updates on the legislation and for more details on the mass protest planned for April 4.
Monday, March 26, 2012
Senate Slows Jindal Train
Louisiana Educator Poll shows little faith in Governor's reform bills
The most recent poll of readers of this blog indicates almost no confidence that firing teachers using the Act 54 value-added system will result in improved student performance on state tests. The poll shows that only 3% of the 1200 plus readers who responded believe that student performance will improve significantly. An additional 29% indicated that their may be a small gain in student performance initially which would stall because very little is being done to address the root causes of student under performance. My personal belief (even though this was not addressed in the poll) is that beefing up early childhood education could make a real difference. One part of the governor's legislation, HB 933, proposes to improve early childhood education. But with no adequate funding for early childhood education, (the Governor turned down federal funding for this recently) I believe the Governor's legislation will amount to window dressing.
Reform Package Expected to Allow For More Deliberation in The Senate
Several Senators have insisted that Jindal floor leaders allow time for adequate briefing of Senators on the the Governor's education reform package. Senator Appel has agreed to have the State Superintendent and others provide briefing sessions for senators before they are required to vote on the package.
Well, don't expect that briefing to be "fair and balanced". Educators in the field who really understand how destructive this legislation will be for children and for professional educators need to do their own "briefing" of the legislators. Please use your creativity to set up local meetings with senators in their districts so that educators can engage them in question and answer sessions. I also encourage my readers to go to the LAE website at http://www.lae.org/ and fill out one of the Senate slip protest forms for your senator.
A Letter From a Biology Teacher
The following letter was sent to me recently by a young Biology teacher. I believe it expresses the feelings of many teachers on the current education reform efforts:
To Louisiana Educator:
I wonder; did the schools he attended get an A, B, C, D or F on their school performance score?
I have been teaching now for 13 years, in East Baton Rouge and surrounding parishes, following in the footsteps of “parents” who were in the profession for a combined 65 years. We (previous Jindal supporters) constantly speak of how rewarding the classroom can be, knowing we have the chance to make a difference. However, the conversation is quickly over shadowed by the new era of education-accountability.
Yes, teachers should be accountable; that goes without saying. But to what end? According to Governor Jindal, teachers are now responsible for high school pregnancies. (Tuesday’s paper) Will there ever come a time when we face reality, dare to be politically incorrect and say that parents are equally or more so responsible for their child’s success? Of course not. That would make sense. In the modern classroom, technology is continually integrated, methods of communication between school and home are at an all time high, and teachers are required to attend days of professional development to further enhance knowledge of various learning strategies. Both weekly and daily lesson plans are created to map what will be covered and how it relates to GLE’s (grade level expectations). And above all, we are instructed to reach all 120+ students on an individual basis based on their unique learning style. To make parents aware of public school’s “expectations”, schools were recently given standard letter grades that reflect their overall performance. The grade is based on how well students perform on tests. I taught at (X) High School which received an A and now I teach at (Y) High which received a D; I must have regressed tremendously as a teacher. The SPS, (school performance score) also takes into account graduation rates. So educators are also responsible for attendance and dropout rates. If I had decided to drop out of high school, I am pretty sure my parents would have had something to say about it; my school would have simply provided the paperwork.
We need reform, but not in the classroom. The first public school was opened in 1635 and the basic premise of school--teach/learn-- hasn’t changed. What have changed are the attitudes and ambitions of those who attend. But, when it comes to action and questioning how we can fix what’s broken, it always comes back on the schools. What’s wrong with education? How does your child’s school measure up? And now that measuring stick--whether or not little Johnny can pass a test--will affect my livelihood as a professional. Has anyone making the rules sat in a public school classroom in the last ten years?
In summary, I got into education hoping to make a difference in a child’s life. In my years of experience, I feel I have reached some, not all and therefore I will always have room to grow. With responsibilities continually stacking up, and salaries now being manipulated in front of our faces, the classroom does not seem to be as rewarding as it once was. Schools are trying everything in the arsenal to improve academically and yet, sub par scores seem to be solely represented as a reflection of the schools’ efforts, or lack thereof. The reality is on any given day a classroom teacher may have an hour of face time with a child within a 24 hour period, and that time is divided among all the students in the class. Are the academic expectations put on schools unrealistic? No. But, they CANNOT and WILL NOT solely be reached in the classroom. Reflect on Pasteur’s homage and let’s ALL be accountable. It’s the promise of education, and our future.
The most recent poll of readers of this blog indicates almost no confidence that firing teachers using the Act 54 value-added system will result in improved student performance on state tests. The poll shows that only 3% of the 1200 plus readers who responded believe that student performance will improve significantly. An additional 29% indicated that their may be a small gain in student performance initially which would stall because very little is being done to address the root causes of student under performance. My personal belief (even though this was not addressed in the poll) is that beefing up early childhood education could make a real difference. One part of the governor's legislation, HB 933, proposes to improve early childhood education. But with no adequate funding for early childhood education, (the Governor turned down federal funding for this recently) I believe the Governor's legislation will amount to window dressing.
Reform Package Expected to Allow For More Deliberation in The Senate
Several Senators have insisted that Jindal floor leaders allow time for adequate briefing of Senators on the the Governor's education reform package. Senator Appel has agreed to have the State Superintendent and others provide briefing sessions for senators before they are required to vote on the package.
Well, don't expect that briefing to be "fair and balanced". Educators in the field who really understand how destructive this legislation will be for children and for professional educators need to do their own "briefing" of the legislators. Please use your creativity to set up local meetings with senators in their districts so that educators can engage them in question and answer sessions. I also encourage my readers to go to the LAE website at http://www.lae.org/ and fill out one of the Senate slip protest forms for your senator.
A Letter From a Biology Teacher
The following letter was sent to me recently by a young Biology teacher. I believe it expresses the feelings of many teachers on the current education reform efforts:
To Louisiana Educator:
Louis Pasteur is one of the greatest scientists of all time. With his medical breakthroughs, he extended the lives of millions of people at his time and still today. When he was acknowledged for his accomplishments in 1883, he replied:
“Oh my father and mother (who were both poor and uneducated), it is to you that I owe everything. Thy enthusiasm, my valiant mother, thou passed it on to me. If I have always associated the greatness of science and the greatness of country, it is because I was filled with the feelings that thou hadst inspired. And thou, my dear father, whose life was hard as thy hard trade, thou last shown me what patience and prolonged effort can do. It is to thee that I owe perseverance in daily work. Not only hadst thou qualities which go to make a useful life, but also admiration for great men and women. To look upward, learn to the utmost, to rise ever higher, such was thy teaching.”
I wonder; did the schools he attended get an A, B, C, D or F on their school performance score?
I have been teaching now for 13 years, in East Baton Rouge and surrounding parishes, following in the footsteps of “parents” who were in the profession for a combined 65 years. We (previous Jindal supporters) constantly speak of how rewarding the classroom can be, knowing we have the chance to make a difference. However, the conversation is quickly over shadowed by the new era of education-accountability.
Yes, teachers should be accountable; that goes without saying. But to what end? According to Governor Jindal, teachers are now responsible for high school pregnancies. (Tuesday’s paper) Will there ever come a time when we face reality, dare to be politically incorrect and say that parents are equally or more so responsible for their child’s success? Of course not. That would make sense. In the modern classroom, technology is continually integrated, methods of communication between school and home are at an all time high, and teachers are required to attend days of professional development to further enhance knowledge of various learning strategies. Both weekly and daily lesson plans are created to map what will be covered and how it relates to GLE’s (grade level expectations). And above all, we are instructed to reach all 120+ students on an individual basis based on their unique learning style. To make parents aware of public school’s “expectations”, schools were recently given standard letter grades that reflect their overall performance. The grade is based on how well students perform on tests. I taught at (X) High School which received an A and now I teach at (Y) High which received a D; I must have regressed tremendously as a teacher. The SPS, (school performance score) also takes into account graduation rates. So educators are also responsible for attendance and dropout rates. If I had decided to drop out of high school, I am pretty sure my parents would have had something to say about it; my school would have simply provided the paperwork.
We need reform, but not in the classroom. The first public school was opened in 1635 and the basic premise of school--teach/learn-- hasn’t changed. What have changed are the attitudes and ambitions of those who attend. But, when it comes to action and questioning how we can fix what’s broken, it always comes back on the schools. What’s wrong with education? How does your child’s school measure up? And now that measuring stick--whether or not little Johnny can pass a test--will affect my livelihood as a professional. Has anyone making the rules sat in a public school classroom in the last ten years?
In summary, I got into education hoping to make a difference in a child’s life. In my years of experience, I feel I have reached some, not all and therefore I will always have room to grow. With responsibilities continually stacking up, and salaries now being manipulated in front of our faces, the classroom does not seem to be as rewarding as it once was. Schools are trying everything in the arsenal to improve academically and yet, sub par scores seem to be solely represented as a reflection of the schools’ efforts, or lack thereof. The reality is on any given day a classroom teacher may have an hour of face time with a child within a 24 hour period, and that time is divided among all the students in the class. Are the academic expectations put on schools unrealistic? No. But, they CANNOT and WILL NOT solely be reached in the classroom. Reflect on Pasteur’s homage and let’s ALL be accountable. It’s the promise of education, and our future.
Friday, March 23, 2012
Charter/Voucher Legislation Passes House
The following are the votes of your representatives on HB 976 that will allow public school students to attend private schools at taxpayer expense. To add insult to injury, these voucher schools do not have to meet accountability standards, do not get graded the way public schools do, and students can be promoted beyond the 4th and 8th grade levels even if they do not pass the LEAP! The bill will also add new charter organizations that can cherry pick students from any public schools and a "parent trigger" that can allow a charter organization to run petitions to fast track the takeover of schools. (See the data at the end of this post on the success of takeovers)
Voting FOR HB 976. (61): , Mr. Speaker, and Reps. Abramson, Adams, Arnold, Badon, Barras, Berthelot, Billiot, Bishop, S., Broadwater, Burford, H. Burns, T. Burns, Carmody, Carter, Champagne, Connick, Cromer, Dove, Fannin, Foil, Garofalo, Greene, Guinn, Harris, Havard, Hazel, Henry, Hensgens, Hodges, Hoffmann, Hollis, Honore, Howard, Huval, G. Jackson, Jefferson, N. Landry, Leger, Leopold, Ligi, Lorusso, Moreno, Morris, Jay, Pearson, Ponti, Pugh, Pylant, Richardson, Robideaux, Schexnayder, Schroder, Seabaugh, Shadoin, Simon, Talbot, Thierry, Thompson, Whitney, P. Williams, and Willmott.
Voting AGAINST House Bill 976 (42): Reps. Anders, Armes, Barrow, W. Bishop, Brossett, Brown, Burrell, Chaney, Cox, Danahay, Dixon, Edwards, Franklin, Gaines, Geymann, Gisclair, Guillory, Harrison, Hill, Hunter, K. Jackson, James, Johnson, Jones, Lambert, T. Landry, LeBas, Mack, Miller, Montoucet, Morris, Jim, Norton, Ortego, Pierre, Pope, Price, Reynolds, Richard, Ritchie, Smith, St. Germain, and Thibaut.
NOT Voting (2): Reps. Lopinto, and A. Williams.
Click on this link to read the Advocate story on valiant efforts by many legislators to amend the most damaging portions of this legislation.
Important Note: HB 974 which destroys tenure, seniority, teacher salary schedules, and makes most teachers "at will" employees based on the value-added evaluations also passed. More on this later.
Please start talking to your Senators now and through the weekend while they are in their home districts. Ask for an appointment with a committee of educators to meet with each Senator. We must make this effort for the sake of our schools and students. Please review the chart below which shows how students have performed after their schools have been taken over by charter organizations.
The schools listed, are all the schools taken over outside of New Orleans. They are schools in Caddo, EBR, Pointe Coupee, and St. Helena.
(The School for the Deaf and Visually Impaired are not charters but are run by the state)
Voting FOR HB 976. (61): , Mr. Speaker, and Reps. Abramson, Adams, Arnold, Badon, Barras, Berthelot, Billiot, Bishop, S., Broadwater, Burford, H. Burns, T. Burns, Carmody, Carter, Champagne, Connick, Cromer, Dove, Fannin, Foil, Garofalo, Greene, Guinn, Harris, Havard, Hazel, Henry, Hensgens, Hodges, Hoffmann, Hollis, Honore, Howard, Huval, G. Jackson, Jefferson, N. Landry, Leger, Leopold, Ligi, Lorusso, Moreno, Morris, Jay, Pearson, Ponti, Pugh, Pylant, Richardson, Robideaux, Schexnayder, Schroder, Seabaugh, Shadoin, Simon, Talbot, Thierry, Thompson, Whitney, P. Williams, and Willmott.
Voting AGAINST House Bill 976 (42): Reps. Anders, Armes, Barrow, W. Bishop, Brossett, Brown, Burrell, Chaney, Cox, Danahay, Dixon, Edwards, Franklin, Gaines, Geymann, Gisclair, Guillory, Harrison, Hill, Hunter, K. Jackson, James, Johnson, Jones, Lambert, T. Landry, LeBas, Mack, Miller, Montoucet, Morris, Jim, Norton, Ortego, Pierre, Pope, Price, Reynolds, Richard, Ritchie, Smith, St. Germain, and Thibaut.
NOT Voting (2): Reps. Lopinto, and A. Williams.
Click on this link to read the Advocate story on valiant efforts by many legislators to amend the most damaging portions of this legislation.
Important Note: HB 974 which destroys tenure, seniority, teacher salary schedules, and makes most teachers "at will" employees based on the value-added evaluations also passed. More on this later.
Please start talking to your Senators now and through the weekend while they are in their home districts. Ask for an appointment with a committee of educators to meet with each Senator. We must make this effort for the sake of our schools and students. Please review the chart below which shows how students have performed after their schools have been taken over by charter organizations.
The schools listed, are all the schools taken over outside of New Orleans. They are schools in Caddo, EBR, Pointe Coupee, and St. Helena.
(The School for the Deaf and Visually Impaired are not charters but are run by the state)
| School Performance Scores Before and After State Takeover | ||||
| Schools | SPS Before | SPS After | grade after | |
| Linwood Mid | 52.2 | 49.9 | F | |
| Linear Mid | 53.9 | 49.9 | F | |
| Crestworth Mid | 49.9 | 50.9 | F | |
| Glen Oaks Mid | 101.9 | 43.8 | F | |
| Prescott Mid | 37.6 | 42.1 | F | |
| Kennelworth Mid. | 71.5 | 66.5 | D | |
| Pointe Coupee Sr | 51.4 | 49.5 | F | |
| Dalton Elem | 61.3 | 50.4 | F | |
| Lanier Elem | 65.1 | 45.4 | F | |
| St. Helena Mid | 57.9 | 47.6 | F | |
| Captol Sr Boys | 46.8 | 41.2 | F | |
| Capitol Sr. Girls | 57.2 | 47.2 | F | |
| School for Deaf | 29.9 | F | ||
| School for Vis. Imp. | 48.2 | F | ||
Tuesday, March 20, 2012
Jindal Bills on House Floor Thursday
Breaking News: All of the action on the Governor's Reform bills will be concentrated on the House floor and will not get to the Senate until late next week or later. Please focus your major efforts on the members of the House of Representatives! Click here to read Representative Edwards' letter to the editor.
LAE lobbyist Shane Riddle informed me this morning that HB 974 and HB 976 are scheduled for consideration on the House Floor starting at 9:00 a. m. Thursday, March 22. The debate could be extensive.
LAE has created a wonderful contact system for the House members called the "White Slip Protest". It is modeled after Sharyn Hebert's Red Card Initiative. But this is kicked up a notch! Just click on this link to the LAE website and you will be guided into sending a message directly to your Representative that he cannot ignore! Why not get a group of teachers together at your school and make sure everyone gets their White Slip in to the Legislature today?
In addition please make phone calls as described below:
The following are my suggestions for reaching your Representative in the next 2 days. You may telephone your Representative at the capitol at 225-342-6945. They are expected to be in committee meetings during most of the day Tuesday and Wednesday, so try leaving a message asking your Rep. to return your call. Both of those days, the House floor will be in session starting at 4:00 p. m. Your best chance of reaching them would be from 4:00 p. m. on. If you have your Rep's cell number this is the best way to reach him/her. On Thursday, while they are debating, you can call them at the above number any time during the day. If you can't get through, ask the clerk to take your message to the Representative.
Let me tell you what to expect in a conversation with your Rep. if he/she is looking for an excuse to vote with the Governor. Many legislators will tell teachers that they have studied the bills carefully and they are convinced that no "good teachers" will be harmed. Also they will say that the voucher and charter impact will be minimal and will probably not affect the schools in your area. In any case, the legislator will tell you he intends to monitor the law carefully to make sure none of "his people" are hurt. All of the preceding is just a smokescreen to allow him/her to vote with the Governor.
This is my suggested argument for any educator calling his/her legislator. "Yes, we believe every teacher will be hurt because teachers will be forced to teach even more than ever to the state tests to make sure that their job is not jeopardized. This hurts teachers because teaching this way is unprofessional and demoralizing. It hurts the students because they will not get the education they deserve. Filling out multiple choice tests is not education for life."
As far as not hurting your school, any new charters or voucher schools will attempt to skim the best students away from any and all schools in their area, not just the D or F schools. By the way, it is not always true that low letter grade schools have poor teachers. Some of the most dedicated teachers teach in low letter grade schools. Those schools almost always have low letter grades because they have a high proportion of at-risk, high poverty students, not because they have bad teachers.
One more thing. Even in public schools serving more privileged students, with Act 54, a teacher can get a low performance score if his/her students do not "gain value" according to some obscure formula coming out of Baton Rouge. So there are plenty of reasons why "good" teachers and "good" schools will be unfairly hurt by this legislation. Do not buy their bull!
The following vote to refer HB 976 to the Appropriations Committee is seen by some observers as an indication of how legislators are leaning on the bill. That is, if a legislator voted Nay on the move to refer it to the Appropriations committee, he/she may be joining the effort to push the bill through without adequate consideration. The votes were as follows:
HB 976 BY CARTER
PASS TO THIRD READING
SUBSTITUTE MOTION
RECOMMIT TO THE COMMITTEE ON APPRO
Date: 3/19/2012
Time: 4:49:43 PM
ROLL CALL
The roll was called with the following result:
LAE lobbyist Shane Riddle informed me this morning that HB 974 and HB 976 are scheduled for consideration on the House Floor starting at 9:00 a. m. Thursday, March 22. The debate could be extensive.
LAE has created a wonderful contact system for the House members called the "White Slip Protest". It is modeled after Sharyn Hebert's Red Card Initiative. But this is kicked up a notch! Just click on this link to the LAE website and you will be guided into sending a message directly to your Representative that he cannot ignore! Why not get a group of teachers together at your school and make sure everyone gets their White Slip in to the Legislature today?
In addition please make phone calls as described below:
The following are my suggestions for reaching your Representative in the next 2 days. You may telephone your Representative at the capitol at 225-342-6945. They are expected to be in committee meetings during most of the day Tuesday and Wednesday, so try leaving a message asking your Rep. to return your call. Both of those days, the House floor will be in session starting at 4:00 p. m. Your best chance of reaching them would be from 4:00 p. m. on. If you have your Rep's cell number this is the best way to reach him/her. On Thursday, while they are debating, you can call them at the above number any time during the day. If you can't get through, ask the clerk to take your message to the Representative.
Let me tell you what to expect in a conversation with your Rep. if he/she is looking for an excuse to vote with the Governor. Many legislators will tell teachers that they have studied the bills carefully and they are convinced that no "good teachers" will be harmed. Also they will say that the voucher and charter impact will be minimal and will probably not affect the schools in your area. In any case, the legislator will tell you he intends to monitor the law carefully to make sure none of "his people" are hurt. All of the preceding is just a smokescreen to allow him/her to vote with the Governor.
This is my suggested argument for any educator calling his/her legislator. "Yes, we believe every teacher will be hurt because teachers will be forced to teach even more than ever to the state tests to make sure that their job is not jeopardized. This hurts teachers because teaching this way is unprofessional and demoralizing. It hurts the students because they will not get the education they deserve. Filling out multiple choice tests is not education for life."
As far as not hurting your school, any new charters or voucher schools will attempt to skim the best students away from any and all schools in their area, not just the D or F schools. By the way, it is not always true that low letter grade schools have poor teachers. Some of the most dedicated teachers teach in low letter grade schools. Those schools almost always have low letter grades because they have a high proportion of at-risk, high poverty students, not because they have bad teachers.
One more thing. Even in public schools serving more privileged students, with Act 54, a teacher can get a low performance score if his/her students do not "gain value" according to some obscure formula coming out of Baton Rouge. So there are plenty of reasons why "good" teachers and "good" schools will be unfairly hurt by this legislation. Do not buy their bull!
The following vote to refer HB 976 to the Appropriations Committee is seen by some observers as an indication of how legislators are leaning on the bill. That is, if a legislator voted Nay on the move to refer it to the Appropriations committee, he/she may be joining the effort to push the bill through without adequate consideration. The votes were as follows:
2012 Regular Session
Sequence: 7 HBS REPORTED BY COMMITTEEHB 976 BY CARTER
PASS TO THIRD READING
SUBSTITUTE MOTION
RECOMMIT TO THE COMMITTEE ON APPRO
Date: 3/19/2012
Time: 4:49:43 PM
ROLL CALL
The roll was called with the following result:
YEAS
Armes Barrow Bishop, W. Burrell Chaney Cox Dixon Edwards Franklin Gaines Total -- 34 | Gisclair Guinn Honore Hunter Jackson, G. Jackson, K. James Johnson Jones Landry, T. | LeBas Montoucet Norton Ortego Pierre Price Reynolds Richard Ritchie Smith | St. Germain Thierry Williams, A. Williams, P. |
NAYS
Mr. Speaker Abramson Adams Anders Arnold Badon Barras Berthelot Billiot Bishop, S. Broadwater Brossett Brown Burford Burns, H. Burns, T. Total -- 64 | Carmody Carter Champagne Cromer Danahay Fannin Foil Garofalo Geymann Greene Harris Harrison Havard Hazel Henry Hensgens | Hodges Hoffmann Hollis Howard Huval Jefferson Lambert Landry, N. Leger Leopold Ligi Lorusso Mack Miller Moreno Morris, Jay | Morris, Jim Pearson Ponti Pope Pugh Pylant Richardson Robideaux Schexnayder Schroder Seabaugh Shadoin Talbot Thompson Whitney Willmott |
ABSENT
Connick Dove | Guillory Hill | Lopinto Simon | Thibaut Total -- |
Sunday, March 18, 2012
You Can Make a Difference!
Many legislators will probably be in their home districts until Monday afternoon. Both the House and Senate are scheduled to go back into session at 4:00 p. m. Monday.
I am suggesting that you go to the LAE website for critical information on how to contact your legislators. Contact them early and often. Always be courteous. Be bold. Ask for your legislator's cell number so you can text or call him/her while the Governor's bills are being debated. Take the time to inform yourself. Read the bills because legislators will try to tell you that this is not so bad, and that it will not affect "good" teachers or good schools.
Look, I'm not going to lie to you. The odds are stacked in the Governor's favor. Right now he is the most powerful governor I have seen in my 40 years of observing the legislature! We have all seen him willing to punish any legislator who has the nerve to buck him in any way. But that can change! Those legislators are elected by the people, not the Governor! Teachers work miracles with their students every day because of their creativity and dedication. For once, please use that creativity and dedication to save your profession.
If you click on the bill numbers listed here you can view the bills going to the House and Senate floor this week. The Senate will be debating SB 597 and SB 603. The House will be debating HB 974 and 976.
You need to read this blog at Teacher in A Strange Land, (this article was recommended by one of my readers) so you can see how easily things can go wrong with value-added evaluation. The more accounts I read about this nutty scheme, the more I realize that it is a travesty that legislators would blindly mandate this as a way of destroying teacher tenure and for firing a certain percentage of teachers each year. What's shocking is that in certain instances it can result in firing some really good teachers! There is a case of a highly acclaimed teacher in Washington DC who was fired because the school administrator had allowed or encouraged cheating on the test the year before, and therefore her students' beginning scores were inflated and her value-added score was unsatisfactory! This was only learned after she was fired and fortunately was able to get a job in another system. By the way, this scenario was set in motion during the administration of Michelle Rhee as Superintendent of Washington DC schools.
For your information: A new group was formed in Louisiana a few weeks ago, for the purpose of trying to get teachers to support and testify in favor Governor Jindal's reform package. Governor Jindal highly recommended Rayne Martin, a non-educator administrator from the LDOE who left her post there to become the director of Stand For Children Louisiana. A principal told me that Rayne Martin had trained a group of principals in using the new COMPASS evaluation system for the Act 54 evaluation. Imagine that! A non-educator with absolutely no education credentials and no teaching experience training highly experienced principals about how to evaluate teachers. That would be like sending in a history teacher to train doctors on how to use a new surgical method! This is who has been developing the new evaluation plan for you this coming year. What an insult to professional educators. Why didn't our local superintendents object to this? Are we so used to being treating like cattle that we have no pride?
The CEO of the national office of Stand For Children is Emma Bloomberg, the daughter of billionaire Mayor of New York, Michael Bloomberg. I think Bloomberg should give Rayne Martin an "ineffective" evaluation because she was only able to get two Louisiana teachers to testify in favor of the reforms during the debate in both committees last week. (One of the teachers said she was in favor of HB 974 because it did away with seniority in RIF and she was only a second year teacher in danger of being laid off using the present system) Maybe Martin should be placed on an "intensive assistance" program because she did not produce the "value-added goals" in her new job.
I am suggesting that you go to the LAE website for critical information on how to contact your legislators. Contact them early and often. Always be courteous. Be bold. Ask for your legislator's cell number so you can text or call him/her while the Governor's bills are being debated. Take the time to inform yourself. Read the bills because legislators will try to tell you that this is not so bad, and that it will not affect "good" teachers or good schools.
Look, I'm not going to lie to you. The odds are stacked in the Governor's favor. Right now he is the most powerful governor I have seen in my 40 years of observing the legislature! We have all seen him willing to punish any legislator who has the nerve to buck him in any way. But that can change! Those legislators are elected by the people, not the Governor! Teachers work miracles with their students every day because of their creativity and dedication. For once, please use that creativity and dedication to save your profession.
If you click on the bill numbers listed here you can view the bills going to the House and Senate floor this week. The Senate will be debating SB 597 and SB 603. The House will be debating HB 974 and 976.
You need to read this blog at Teacher in A Strange Land, (this article was recommended by one of my readers) so you can see how easily things can go wrong with value-added evaluation. The more accounts I read about this nutty scheme, the more I realize that it is a travesty that legislators would blindly mandate this as a way of destroying teacher tenure and for firing a certain percentage of teachers each year. What's shocking is that in certain instances it can result in firing some really good teachers! There is a case of a highly acclaimed teacher in Washington DC who was fired because the school administrator had allowed or encouraged cheating on the test the year before, and therefore her students' beginning scores were inflated and her value-added score was unsatisfactory! This was only learned after she was fired and fortunately was able to get a job in another system. By the way, this scenario was set in motion during the administration of Michelle Rhee as Superintendent of Washington DC schools.
For your information: A new group was formed in Louisiana a few weeks ago, for the purpose of trying to get teachers to support and testify in favor Governor Jindal's reform package. Governor Jindal highly recommended Rayne Martin, a non-educator administrator from the LDOE who left her post there to become the director of Stand For Children Louisiana. A principal told me that Rayne Martin had trained a group of principals in using the new COMPASS evaluation system for the Act 54 evaluation. Imagine that! A non-educator with absolutely no education credentials and no teaching experience training highly experienced principals about how to evaluate teachers. That would be like sending in a history teacher to train doctors on how to use a new surgical method! This is who has been developing the new evaluation plan for you this coming year. What an insult to professional educators. Why didn't our local superintendents object to this? Are we so used to being treating like cattle that we have no pride?
The CEO of the national office of Stand For Children is Emma Bloomberg, the daughter of billionaire Mayor of New York, Michael Bloomberg. I think Bloomberg should give Rayne Martin an "ineffective" evaluation because she was only able to get two Louisiana teachers to testify in favor of the reforms during the debate in both committees last week. (One of the teachers said she was in favor of HB 974 because it did away with seniority in RIF and she was only a second year teacher in danger of being laid off using the present system) Maybe Martin should be placed on an "intensive assistance" program because she did not produce the "value-added goals" in her new job.
Friday, March 16, 2012
Jinadal Bills Going to Floor Votes Soon
Governor Jindal succeeded, with the help of carefully stacked committees, to move his education reform legislation through both House and Senate Education Committees. See the Advocate story linked here. As usual, the description of the bills in the big business controlled newspaper "forgets" to include a description of some of the most destructive portions of the legislation. Did I mention that The Advocate has refused to print my letter to the editor about the Governor's war on public education?
Don't believe for a minute that the newspapers are unbiased on these issues. When I met with the editors of the Advocate a year ago, concerning the distortions of school efforts produced by the new school letter grading system, they admitted to me that they favored "anything but public schools". The newspaper also forgot to mention that there were even more teachers at the Capitol Thursday than the day before, and that the Senate committee severely limited debate refusing to hear from the great majority of teachers that had signed up to testify.
As these public education destruction bills go to the House and Senate floors for a vote possibly next week it is critical that educators meet with their legislators if possible to express opposition to the legislation. You may want to form a committee of educators, (include your principal if possible) to actually try to meet with the legislators while they are in their home districts this weekend or early next week. One of the primary rules of politics is that you cannot accuse a legislator of voting wrong on an issue if you have never personally communicated with him/her on the issue. The best approach is a face-to-face meeting, but letters and emails are also effective.
One of the important facts many newspapers forget to mention is that the most dangerous part of the voucher/charter legislation is that it will allow private companies to set up brand new charter schools in any parish that have nothing to do with turning around failing schools (they have been absolutely ineffective at doing this). These schools will be able to cherry pick the best students by calling themselves college prep schools leaving the public schools to educate the rest. Also, because of a special exemption, they will be able to hire uncertified persons to teach. This undermines the teaching profession as well as damaging the public schools and starving them of funding.
Another important fact left out of newspaper reports is that the teacher dismissal legislation allows the value-added results to overrule your Principal's evaluation in determining you to be an ineffective teacher. The new evaluation system that is mandated but not described in the legislation requires that 10% of teachers evaluated using Act 54 rules must be determined to be ineffective and placed on a path to dismissal each year. This could put thousands of teachers on a path to dismissal within just a few years of the program.
Now for your reading pleasure, I would like to recommend that you go to a very prestigious national blog for teachers that carries an account by one of Louisiana's National Board Certified teachers about how the Governor's education reform package was introduced in Louisiana. Click on this link to read the blog Teacher In A Strange Land. Note the disdain with which the big business types treat professional educators that are not part of their hand picked privatization corps.
By the way: A few days ago when I was adding to this blog, my virus protection service flashed a warning on my screen "Incoming worm/virus detected. Its purpose is to destroy or erase all components of your current website". Luckily my virus protection worked. But I don't know how much longer this blog will be on line. Not paranoid, just cautious.
Don't believe for a minute that the newspapers are unbiased on these issues. When I met with the editors of the Advocate a year ago, concerning the distortions of school efforts produced by the new school letter grading system, they admitted to me that they favored "anything but public schools". The newspaper also forgot to mention that there were even more teachers at the Capitol Thursday than the day before, and that the Senate committee severely limited debate refusing to hear from the great majority of teachers that had signed up to testify.
As these public education destruction bills go to the House and Senate floors for a vote possibly next week it is critical that educators meet with their legislators if possible to express opposition to the legislation. You may want to form a committee of educators, (include your principal if possible) to actually try to meet with the legislators while they are in their home districts this weekend or early next week. One of the primary rules of politics is that you cannot accuse a legislator of voting wrong on an issue if you have never personally communicated with him/her on the issue. The best approach is a face-to-face meeting, but letters and emails are also effective.
One of the important facts many newspapers forget to mention is that the most dangerous part of the voucher/charter legislation is that it will allow private companies to set up brand new charter schools in any parish that have nothing to do with turning around failing schools (they have been absolutely ineffective at doing this). These schools will be able to cherry pick the best students by calling themselves college prep schools leaving the public schools to educate the rest. Also, because of a special exemption, they will be able to hire uncertified persons to teach. This undermines the teaching profession as well as damaging the public schools and starving them of funding.
Another important fact left out of newspaper reports is that the teacher dismissal legislation allows the value-added results to overrule your Principal's evaluation in determining you to be an ineffective teacher. The new evaluation system that is mandated but not described in the legislation requires that 10% of teachers evaluated using Act 54 rules must be determined to be ineffective and placed on a path to dismissal each year. This could put thousands of teachers on a path to dismissal within just a few years of the program.
Now for your reading pleasure, I would like to recommend that you go to a very prestigious national blog for teachers that carries an account by one of Louisiana's National Board Certified teachers about how the Governor's education reform package was introduced in Louisiana. Click on this link to read the blog Teacher In A Strange Land. Note the disdain with which the big business types treat professional educators that are not part of their hand picked privatization corps.
By the way: A few days ago when I was adding to this blog, my virus protection service flashed a warning on my screen "Incoming worm/virus detected. Its purpose is to destroy or erase all components of your current website". Luckily my virus protection worked. But I don't know how much longer this blog will be on line. Not paranoid, just cautious.
Thursday, March 15, 2012
HB 976 and 974 Pushed Through Committee
(The following is a report of events at the Capitol on Wednesday, by the Louisiana Association of Educators) See also The Advocate story linked here.
Gov. Jindal Attempts to Suppress Educators & Thousands Push Back to Make Voices Heard
Educators Testify on Capitol Steps to Express Outrage over Attempt To Ram Education Package Through Legislature
BATON ROUGE, LA – March 14, 2012 – Thousands of education stakeholders flooded the steps of the Louisiana State Capitol Wednesday, but a majority of the teachers, support professionals, administrators – even parents and students – who showed up, were forced to remain outside on the Capitol steps due to the governor’s orders of closing down alternative entrances into the building.
“They wouldn’t let people in because they said the committee rooms were full, but it looked like Governor Jindal was trying to keep educators out of the room during his testimony,” said LAE President Joyce Haynes. “If he really believed in his plan, then he should have taken this opportunity to stand before educators and put it all out on the table; instead, he chose to lock us out of the process.”
School employees from across the state came together in Baton Rouge to speak against the governor’s extreme education agenda brought forth in House Bill 976. The bill calls for taking public tax dollars and turning them over to for-profit charter schools. It also calls for the expansion of a statewide school choice program. Educators want to know why the governor is demanding a rush to vote on such complex legislation that impacts the future of Louisiana’s public schools.
“It is the Legislature’s responsibility to schedule a fair hearing process that allows us to offer input on those bills that affect us,” said Haynes.
U.S. Senator Mary Landrieu sided with school employees as she spoke out against the rush. She agrees that the governor is moving outrageously fast to try to win committee approval for his plan.
"If this is such a great reform package, it should be able to stand the test of review. This is a democracy. This isn't a dictatorship," Landrieu said in an interview.
“We were forced to attend on a school day,” said Haynes. “Legislators should have made the appropriate move to schedule these hearings when education employees are available to attend, like in the evenings or on the weekends.”
House Education Committee approves both HB 976 and 974
The House Education Committee met until late Wednesday night and heard testimony from LAE, LFT and dozens of individual teachers before adopting both of Governor Jindal's key "reform" bills. Huge stacks of Red opposition cards sat on the committee desk top as teachers jammed every available inch of space inside the capitol. The rest waited patiently outside the Capitol. I was there also, and testified against HB 974. I witnessed only one teacher out of the crowd of about 2,000 who actually testified in favor of this bill. She said she was a second year teacher, and according to her testimony, she liked the provision of the bill that outlawed the use of seniority for reduction in force. She said her school system may soon be laying off teachers.
After initially insulting the teachers who had signed up to testify by passing a motion that testifiers should state the type of leave they were requesting before testifying, the committee met for over 15 hours and attempted to hear from everyone. The motion to intimidate teachers did not work as expected and was denounced by several members of the committee and even Senator Karen Peterson who came before the committee on personal privilege and called the motion shameful and unprecedented. Teachers went on to testify unfazed, with some expressing sarcasm about the "requirement".
Unfortunately, the committee was obviously stacked by the Governor and his floor leaders to insure that the bills would pass no mater what. The committee split on 12-6 and 13-5 votes in favor of approval of the two bills. I will report later on how individual legislators voted.
The Senate Education Committee is scheduled to hear the Senate versions of the bills, at approximately 9:00 a.m. Thursday. Another large delegation of educators is expected to attend, and again request to be heard.
Tuesday, March 13, 2012
Let's Review the Democratic Process
On Wednesday at 8:30 a.m. the House Education Committee will hold a hearing on Governor Jindal's education reform package in Committee Room 1 at the Capitol. This legislation will include at least HB 974 and HB 976. The Senate Education Committee will have a hearing on the Senate versions of the bills on Thursday. Thank you to St Martin Parish and Vermilion Parish School Boards for making it easy for educators to attend. Educators in other parishes must try their best to participate also.
HB 974 basically destroys teacher tenure and eventually makes almost all teachers "at will" employees with approximately the same employment status and job security as a teenage store clerk. If the bill passes, school systems will be mandated to make most teacher employment decisions based on student test scores. But with this legislation, teachers who never achieve, or who lose tenure because of one bad evaluation can be fired for any reason with little recourse.
The above legislation is patterned after extremely destructive legislation that is being introduced all over the country by a conservative big business group called ALEC. Click on this link to read a description of ALEC activities. This group is funded by school privatization interests such as K-12 Virtual Schools.
The Education Committee process is as follows: Prior to the start of the meeting proponents and opponents of the bills to be heard may be seated in Committee Room 1 which is on the ground floor of the Capitol on the House side. Seating is on a first come first served basis after the doors to the committee room are unlocked about half an hour before the meeting. Proponents of the bills may fill out a green card and may request to testify on the bill or just indicate support. Opponents fill out a red card and may request to testify against the bill. The hearing begins when the author of the bill is allowed to introduce the bill and discussion proceeds. At some point the chair calls for testimony from the audience. After discussion of pros and cons, committee members make appropriate motions and the bill may be voted up, down, or other approved disposition. If the bill passes it must go through the rest of the legislative process.
Please send emails to your legislator and to members of the House Education Committee. Attend the hearing if possible. Click on this link to use your address to get to your legislator web pages. Their Email addresses are listed there.
Many Educators should also attend the Senate Education Committee meeting on Thursday morning about 9:00 a.m. where the Senate versions of the same bills will be heard upon adjournment of the morning Senate session. Please send emails to your Senator and to the Senate Education Committee members before Thursday.
The future of your profession and the public school system is at stake. Please do everything possible to exercise your democratic rights and represent your profession.
Sincerely,
Michael Deshotels
HB 974 basically destroys teacher tenure and eventually makes almost all teachers "at will" employees with approximately the same employment status and job security as a teenage store clerk. If the bill passes, school systems will be mandated to make most teacher employment decisions based on student test scores. But with this legislation, teachers who never achieve, or who lose tenure because of one bad evaluation can be fired for any reason with little recourse.
- The bill absolutely outlaws any layoff decisions for teachers based on seniority. A 25 year teacher must be laid off before a first year teacher if the new value-added evaluation yields even a slightly higher score for the first year teacher. No consideration can be given to the older teacher's 25 years of service to the school system or previous good evaluations.
- Each teacher automatically loses tenure upon receipt of an evaluation of "ineffective" no matter how many excellent evaluations he/she has received in the past.
- The Act 54 evaluation of a teacher that results in an "ineffective" rating shall be considered proof that the teacher is incompetent. Such teacher can be fired at any time without a tenure hearing.
- Even if the teacher's principal rates a teacher as "highly effective" on the qualitative part of the evaluation, a value-added result of "ineffective" overrules the Principal's evaluation and the teacher will receive a final evaluation of "ineffective".
- With this legislation our Governor and State Superintendent of Education are willing to bet the careers of thousands of teachers that an untested value-added evaluation which is producing highly erratic results in other states will accurately identify the 10% of Louisiana teachers that deserve to be fired each year. (According to the Act 54 evaluation plan, the bottom scoring 10% of teachers automatically get rated "ineffective".)
The above legislation is patterned after extremely destructive legislation that is being introduced all over the country by a conservative big business group called ALEC. Click on this link to read a description of ALEC activities. This group is funded by school privatization interests such as K-12 Virtual Schools.
The Education Committee process is as follows: Prior to the start of the meeting proponents and opponents of the bills to be heard may be seated in Committee Room 1 which is on the ground floor of the Capitol on the House side. Seating is on a first come first served basis after the doors to the committee room are unlocked about half an hour before the meeting. Proponents of the bills may fill out a green card and may request to testify on the bill or just indicate support. Opponents fill out a red card and may request to testify against the bill. The hearing begins when the author of the bill is allowed to introduce the bill and discussion proceeds. At some point the chair calls for testimony from the audience. After discussion of pros and cons, committee members make appropriate motions and the bill may be voted up, down, or other approved disposition. If the bill passes it must go through the rest of the legislative process.
Please send emails to your legislator and to members of the House Education Committee. Attend the hearing if possible. Click on this link to use your address to get to your legislator web pages. Their Email addresses are listed there.
Many Educators should also attend the Senate Education Committee meeting on Thursday morning about 9:00 a.m. where the Senate versions of the same bills will be heard upon adjournment of the morning Senate session. Please send emails to your Senator and to the Senate Education Committee members before Thursday.
The future of your profession and the public school system is at stake. Please do everything possible to exercise your democratic rights and represent your profession.
Sincerely,
Michael Deshotels
Monday, March 12, 2012
The Object is to Fire Teachers; and Lots of Them
Have you sent emails to your legislators yet? Time is running out! Just scroll down to my Friday, March 9th post to get sample emails.Well it turns out that the Governor's teacher dismissal legislation, (HB 974 or SB 603) is even worse than I thought it was. When you combine the new legislation with the implementation of the Act 54 evaluation, there are two major ways a teacher can lose tenure and get fired! An astute reader of my blog posted a comment to last Friday's post to point out that according to a letter dated Feb. 28 sent to local superintendents by John White (go to page 4 to the section titled Final Evaluation), a teacher will get an "ineffective" overall rating if either the value-added (quantitative) portion of the evaluation or the Principal's evaluation (qualitative) part of the evaluation is unsatisfactory. So even if your principal believes you are doing a good job, that value-added part of your evaluation that was supposed to count for only 50% of your evaluation can destroy 100% of your future as a teacher.
Remember, you are not guilty of paranoid thinking if "they" really are out to get you!
John White also sent an ESEA waiver proposal to Washington at the end of February that totally changes the Louisiana accountability system. It takes away almost all the responsibility of the parents, sets totally impossible student testing goals to be achieved by all public schools in two years and proposes that the new evaluation system will require 10% of the teaching force to be rated "ineffective" each year (at least in the LEAP tested subjects).
How did all public school teachers' non-educator "bosses" at the Department of Education come up with the figure of 10% ineffective teachers each year anyway? Believe it or not, it comes from a mis-quote of education researchers' findings concerning the impact of teacher quality on student performance. Follow this link to the Educators For All website to see exactly how important research was twisted to mean something completely different from the conclusions that were made by researchers.
To put it simply, the incorrect assumption that teacher effectiveness is the most important factor in student success, leads our reformers (Governor Jindal and John White) to the inevitable (but incorrect) conclusion that all you have to do is fire the teachers that produce the least student progress (value-added), replace them with new teachers, and in a few years all of our students will perform at or above average! This is junk science based on false assumptions and has never been shown to work.
The primary factor related to student success in school is the rate of poverty (as measured by the percentage of students on free lunch). So if you have the misfortune (or you simply have chosen to work with at-risk students) your future will be at-risk when the Act 54 evaluation is implemented next year. Even if you are teaching more privileged students, value-added can defeat you if your students do not progress as predicted by formulas you will never see. If HB 974 or SB 603 passes, only one bad evaluation (which is in the hands of your students), and your tenure is gone. Also, according to the governor's legislation, the evaluation itself is the ultimate proof that you are "ineffective" and you can be terminated immediately even if you have a hearing. And by law, that bad evaluation result must go to any of your future employers. So much for professional treatment of teachers. So much for the "teacher empowerment" talked about by Jindal and White. There are plenty of horror stories about the value-added evaluations being tested in other states like New York and Tennessee. Just click on this link to look at one example in Washington DC.
Please send emails now to your members in the Legislature, and particularly to members of the House and Senate Education Committees. (Make sure you have correct grammar and no misspelled words) I hope teachers and administrators will take a day of personal leave either Wednesday or Thursday to attend first the House Education Committee, then the Senate Education Committee meeting.
Remember, you are not guilty of paranoid thinking if "they" really are out to get you!
John White also sent an ESEA waiver proposal to Washington at the end of February that totally changes the Louisiana accountability system. It takes away almost all the responsibility of the parents, sets totally impossible student testing goals to be achieved by all public schools in two years and proposes that the new evaluation system will require 10% of the teaching force to be rated "ineffective" each year (at least in the LEAP tested subjects).
How did all public school teachers' non-educator "bosses" at the Department of Education come up with the figure of 10% ineffective teachers each year anyway? Believe it or not, it comes from a mis-quote of education researchers' findings concerning the impact of teacher quality on student performance. Follow this link to the Educators For All website to see exactly how important research was twisted to mean something completely different from the conclusions that were made by researchers.
To put it simply, the incorrect assumption that teacher effectiveness is the most important factor in student success, leads our reformers (Governor Jindal and John White) to the inevitable (but incorrect) conclusion that all you have to do is fire the teachers that produce the least student progress (value-added), replace them with new teachers, and in a few years all of our students will perform at or above average! This is junk science based on false assumptions and has never been shown to work.
The primary factor related to student success in school is the rate of poverty (as measured by the percentage of students on free lunch). So if you have the misfortune (or you simply have chosen to work with at-risk students) your future will be at-risk when the Act 54 evaluation is implemented next year. Even if you are teaching more privileged students, value-added can defeat you if your students do not progress as predicted by formulas you will never see. If HB 974 or SB 603 passes, only one bad evaluation (which is in the hands of your students), and your tenure is gone. Also, according to the governor's legislation, the evaluation itself is the ultimate proof that you are "ineffective" and you can be terminated immediately even if you have a hearing. And by law, that bad evaluation result must go to any of your future employers. So much for professional treatment of teachers. So much for the "teacher empowerment" talked about by Jindal and White. There are plenty of horror stories about the value-added evaluations being tested in other states like New York and Tennessee. Just click on this link to look at one example in Washington DC.
Please send emails now to your members in the Legislature, and particularly to members of the House and Senate Education Committees. (Make sure you have correct grammar and no misspelled words) I hope teachers and administrators will take a day of personal leave either Wednesday or Thursday to attend first the House Education Committee, then the Senate Education Committee meeting.
Friday, March 9, 2012
Jindal Plan Moving Now! March 14-15
Legislators are telling the LAE lobbyists that the Jindal public school destruction bills will be heard first in the House Education Committee on Wednesday March 14, then in the Senate Education Committee on Thursday March 15. I also got a personal call from a Republican Senator friend who told me the same thing.
They are telling us that if we as educators care about public education we had better show up at these committee meetings in large numbers. Our professional education lobbyists for the teacher unions and School Boards Association are heavily outnumbered by the big business lobbyists. And I'm sorry to say they have millions of dollars more than we have to contribute to legislators' campaigns. What we have is numbers! Public school teachers live and vote in every legislative district in this state in large numbers. When you add our voting relatives, we should be the most powerful political force in this state! Why don't we start to exert our potential influence?
I know, it's because teachers and principals are busy preparing kids for the all important LEAP tests! I don't think I am exaggerating when I say that if the Jindal package passes intact, the public schools are in serious trouble and if you continue reading the second portion of this blog and my posts from the last two weeks you will know why.
Please talk to your colleagues now, and plan to take a personal day Wednesday or Thursday, March 14 and 15 to come to the Capitol and show your concern about this disastrous plan. Educators should read the bills carefully and some should plan to testify in the committees. Every educator should go to the legislative web site, get the email address of your Representative and Senator now and send an email immediately indicating your opposition to these bills. I am including two sample emails, but I would expect the creative educators out there to customize their own emails to say exactly how they as individuals feel. Now is the time for us to do something important for our profession.
Here are the bills we expect to be heard; (we now have the official agenda and they are listed). In the House Education Committee starting at 8:30 a.m. March 14, HB 974 and HB 976 will be heard. Please click on the bill number to get the full text of the bill. 974 is the School Employment and tenure bill I discussed in my last post, and 976 is the Voucher and Charter school expansion bill. The corresponding Senate bills that will be heard on March 15 are SB 603 and SB 597. Let me give you the most critical information about the Voucher and Charter school expansion bill.
By far the most destructive part of this bill is the provision that lets BESE authorize a large number of new agencies across the state that can approve new charters in every parish. These charters don't have to tackle turnaround of failing schools. (which have been a dismal failure in the RSD) They will be new charters that can cherry pick the best students from the public schools while public schools continue to serve the left overs. They have every incentive to do this because the new law says that they have to maintain a "B" or better rating. So expect a big PR campaign from these charter companies in your parish to recruit students for college prep schools. If you have resisted setting up magnet schools in your parish because you don't want to pull the best students out of your regular schools, they will specifically target your parish. If you have a lot of middle class families (white and black) who are uncomfortable with the school population in their local school, they will target your parish. Now imagine a few years into the future to see the result of all this. Schools will be re segregated into the haves and have-nots, and the public schools will be left with the have nots.
Now on the issue of HB 974. (tenure nullification and firing teachers based on student test scores) I just want to add a little information to what I gave you earlier this week. The issue is not tenure. Many teachers will tell you they don't care about tenure because they have a principal who knows they are doing a good job and who will never try to fire their good teachers. The problem is this new Act 54 evaluation system will be so erratic and unpredictable that teachers will be mostly at the mercy of the value added formula gurus at the state Department of Education. (there are many horror stories from other states that have tried this) Student performance is supposed to count for only 50% of the evaluation, but I firmly believe it will have a much greater impact than 50%. What do you think will happen if you teach in a high poverty school rated as C or D and most of the teachers get a satisfactory evaluation because of the COMPASS portion of the evaluation? Someone from Baton Rouge is going to come down hard on the principal because he/she is not rooting out the "incompetent" teachers. We all know it has nothing to do with teacher competence. "It's the poverty stupid!" You get the picture. This bill puts every educator unfairly at risk. Please start working on your emails to legislators now, and plan on sending a delegation of teachers and administrators to Baton Rouge on March 14 and 15.
This is how you get the email address of all legislators: Click on this link, and type in your address and zip to find all your legislators. Click on each one to go to their web page where you can get the email for your Rep. and Senator.
Additional Resources: Since this was first posted the LAE website has added a great legislator contact feature. Just click here to take advantage of the LAE expertize.
Take my advice. Forget about your party affiliation. This is not a political party issue. It is a survival of education issue. We just want our legislators to represent us and our families for a change when they vote on this.
Here is a simple sample email. I am sure you can improve on this:
Dear (your legislator):
I am a (teacher) (principal) (etc) who lives in your district. I am very much opposed to HB 974 (or SB 603) because it will unfairly base my continued employment as a teacher on student test scores. I do my job faithfully as a teacher but I have no control over students whose parents send them to school unprepared or let them miss too much school or allow them to refuse to do homework or study. I do not want to have my job and my due process destroyed because of factors over which I have no control. Please vote against this bill. My family and I are depending on you to represent us, not some unproven system.
Here is one for HB 976 and SB 597
Dear (your legislator)
I am a public school educator in your district. I am writing to ask you to oppose HB 976 or (SB 597). This bill (along with a lot of other bad provisions) allows private companies to come into our parish and establish a school that will cherry pick our students so that some individuals can make a profit off of our children. This will not improve education. It will simply further damage our public schools and endanger public educator's careers. Please vote against this bill.
Finally, I strongly recommend that schools have faculty meetings to plan your strategy on this. Someone needs to take the lead and research the bills and inform everyone. Send them to this blog. Do everything you can!
They are telling us that if we as educators care about public education we had better show up at these committee meetings in large numbers. Our professional education lobbyists for the teacher unions and School Boards Association are heavily outnumbered by the big business lobbyists. And I'm sorry to say they have millions of dollars more than we have to contribute to legislators' campaigns. What we have is numbers! Public school teachers live and vote in every legislative district in this state in large numbers. When you add our voting relatives, we should be the most powerful political force in this state! Why don't we start to exert our potential influence?
I know, it's because teachers and principals are busy preparing kids for the all important LEAP tests! I don't think I am exaggerating when I say that if the Jindal package passes intact, the public schools are in serious trouble and if you continue reading the second portion of this blog and my posts from the last two weeks you will know why.
Please talk to your colleagues now, and plan to take a personal day Wednesday or Thursday, March 14 and 15 to come to the Capitol and show your concern about this disastrous plan. Educators should read the bills carefully and some should plan to testify in the committees. Every educator should go to the legislative web site, get the email address of your Representative and Senator now and send an email immediately indicating your opposition to these bills. I am including two sample emails, but I would expect the creative educators out there to customize their own emails to say exactly how they as individuals feel. Now is the time for us to do something important for our profession.
Here are the bills we expect to be heard; (we now have the official agenda and they are listed). In the House Education Committee starting at 8:30 a.m. March 14, HB 974 and HB 976 will be heard. Please click on the bill number to get the full text of the bill. 974 is the School Employment and tenure bill I discussed in my last post, and 976 is the Voucher and Charter school expansion bill. The corresponding Senate bills that will be heard on March 15 are SB 603 and SB 597. Let me give you the most critical information about the Voucher and Charter school expansion bill.
By far the most destructive part of this bill is the provision that lets BESE authorize a large number of new agencies across the state that can approve new charters in every parish. These charters don't have to tackle turnaround of failing schools. (which have been a dismal failure in the RSD) They will be new charters that can cherry pick the best students from the public schools while public schools continue to serve the left overs. They have every incentive to do this because the new law says that they have to maintain a "B" or better rating. So expect a big PR campaign from these charter companies in your parish to recruit students for college prep schools. If you have resisted setting up magnet schools in your parish because you don't want to pull the best students out of your regular schools, they will specifically target your parish. If you have a lot of middle class families (white and black) who are uncomfortable with the school population in their local school, they will target your parish. Now imagine a few years into the future to see the result of all this. Schools will be re segregated into the haves and have-nots, and the public schools will be left with the have nots.
Now on the issue of HB 974. (tenure nullification and firing teachers based on student test scores) I just want to add a little information to what I gave you earlier this week. The issue is not tenure. Many teachers will tell you they don't care about tenure because they have a principal who knows they are doing a good job and who will never try to fire their good teachers. The problem is this new Act 54 evaluation system will be so erratic and unpredictable that teachers will be mostly at the mercy of the value added formula gurus at the state Department of Education. (there are many horror stories from other states that have tried this) Student performance is supposed to count for only 50% of the evaluation, but I firmly believe it will have a much greater impact than 50%. What do you think will happen if you teach in a high poverty school rated as C or D and most of the teachers get a satisfactory evaluation because of the COMPASS portion of the evaluation? Someone from Baton Rouge is going to come down hard on the principal because he/she is not rooting out the "incompetent" teachers. We all know it has nothing to do with teacher competence. "It's the poverty stupid!" You get the picture. This bill puts every educator unfairly at risk. Please start working on your emails to legislators now, and plan on sending a delegation of teachers and administrators to Baton Rouge on March 14 and 15.
This is how you get the email address of all legislators: Click on this link, and type in your address and zip to find all your legislators. Click on each one to go to their web page where you can get the email for your Rep. and Senator.
Additional Resources: Since this was first posted the LAE website has added a great legislator contact feature. Just click here to take advantage of the LAE expertize.
Take my advice. Forget about your party affiliation. This is not a political party issue. It is a survival of education issue. We just want our legislators to represent us and our families for a change when they vote on this.
Here is a simple sample email. I am sure you can improve on this:
Dear (your legislator):
I am a (teacher) (principal) (etc) who lives in your district. I am very much opposed to HB 974 (or SB 603) because it will unfairly base my continued employment as a teacher on student test scores. I do my job faithfully as a teacher but I have no control over students whose parents send them to school unprepared or let them miss too much school or allow them to refuse to do homework or study. I do not want to have my job and my due process destroyed because of factors over which I have no control. Please vote against this bill. My family and I are depending on you to represent us, not some unproven system.
Here is one for HB 976 and SB 597
Dear (your legislator)
I am a public school educator in your district. I am writing to ask you to oppose HB 976 or (SB 597). This bill (along with a lot of other bad provisions) allows private companies to come into our parish and establish a school that will cherry pick our students so that some individuals can make a profit off of our children. This will not improve education. It will simply further damage our public schools and endanger public educator's careers. Please vote against this bill.
Finally, I strongly recommend that schools have faculty meetings to plan your strategy on this. Someone needs to take the lead and research the bills and inform everyone. Send them to this blog. Do everything you can!
Wednesday, March 7, 2012
Governor Jindal's war on Public Education and Teachers
Part I Changes in Accountability and School Performance Scores: The ESEA No Child Left Behind proposal sent to the US DOE last week is really a major revision of the Louisiana Accountability System. In my opinion, when combined with the new legislation nullifying tenure, making all professional educators' careers dependent on student test scores, and adding unlimited vouchers and charters, it amounts to accountability on steroids. And just like athletes who misuse steroids to get bigger and stronger, this "miracle" reform plan is likely to produce grotesque and damaging results and side effects.
In addition to setting unscientific and unattainable student achievement goals in a two year period, the ESEA waiver proposal drastically changes the mechanism for calculating school performance scores. (see pages 49 - 61 of the ESEA waiver application). To put it briefly the rating system is changed from a 200 point system to a 150 point system yet the points needed for various letter grades are not reset proportionately. Proportionally the minimum "A" should go from 120 to 90, but the lowest A is set at 100. The new B is 85 to 99.9, the new C is 70 to 84.9, and the new D is 50 to 69.9. The numbers have changed drastically but, not to worry. The Department plans to jury rig the scoring system to end up with just about the same numbers of schools falling in each category of letter grades as with the old system. So this seems to indicate what many suspected all along; that the Department can manipulate the numbers to produce whatever results they choose. For example, there will be a fudge factor in the calculation that will award bonus points for schools that make greater than expected progress with low performing sub groups using the new value added formulas. These are formulas like the Coca-Cola formulas that are kept in a safe that only the statistics gurus at the DOE are allowed to study and adjust. This whole scheme is a process that looks scientific because of the fancy formulas, but is really pseudo science used to produce a predetermined result. So local school administrators will only know how it works after the results have been determined.
All schools other than A schools will be expected to increase their SPS by 10 points each year (proportionally this would be like 13.3 points on the old system) so that the state can seem to be progressing to 100% proficiency in only two years. This goal will be unattainable for most schools. No one in the field now really knows what sanctions may result from not attaining these goals.
Now lets look at the main thrust of the attack on public education and teachers:
Part II Legislation, MFP, Vouchers and Charters: (See Diane Ravitch's article on the same legislation linked here)
The major campaign against public education began with a drastic change in the MFP last week by the Jindal controlled BESE. According to the new formula, numerous special schools, charters, and voucher schools will now be able to raid the funding from public schools according to the number of students they gain. One major legal concern is that since the private schools will also raid the component of MFP coming from local taxes that the voters may have approved for specific purposes, this may not be allowed by the constitution. Local school Boards along with the LAE and LFT are encouraged to adopt the LSBA resolution to authorize and pursue an immediate legal challenge.
HB 974 and SB 603 which may be heard in the Senate Education Committee in a full day meeting next Thursday, March 15 will be the big push for destruction of job security for all teachers, principals, and even superintendents! When combined with the implementation of the Act 54 evaluation and the accountability changes described above, these bills (they are identical versions of House and Senate bills) will basically make every educators' job dependent on the student achievement of unrealistic academic goals and could demoralize the teaching profession.
The new legislation will immediately eliminate the normal tenure process for any new teachers and nullify tenure for thousands of experienced teachers. Tenure is ended as soon as a teacher gets one ineffective evaluation. Also, the Act 54 evaluation, in the first year of operation, could put thousands teachers on a path to dismissal because of the mandatory 10% failure factor. This number will only grow by thousands each year as the 10% factor is applied again and again. That's because the evaluation plan for teachers described in that ESEA Waiver will mandate that the bottom scoring 10% of teachers get an evaluation of "ineffective" no matter what local administrators believe about their teachers' effectiveness. This is further complicated by the fact that 66% of teachers in Louisiana are teaching non-tested subjects. It is not clear if the 10% failure factor will be applied to the teachers of non-tested subjects. No one has figured out a practical and equally rigorous way of applying value added goals to these teachers. But who cares?
The Principal's evaluation will also depend partially on the number of teachers rated "ineffective" and principals will be trapped by a "catch 22" situation. If the principal applies the (COMPASS) in too strict a manner, too many teachers will get "ineffective" and the principal is in trouble. If the principal grades teachers too easy and the value added portion shows up poor or negative for the unique student gains expected of each teacher, then the State Department will send an investigation team out to find out why those teachers are not being properly punished! (I'm just guessing on that part). All indications are that the ACT 54 evaluation will produce many erratic and incorrect teacher evaluation results. How can anyone justify tampering with the job security of professional educators in this frivolous manner? Local school boards will have no more say in these issues than the BESE Board has in dealing with Jindal and White.
My readers are sophisticated intelligent people. You know what will happen if HB 976 and SB 597 (The charter and voucher expansion bills) pass. This will introduce a major conflict between privatization forces and local school boards. The parent trigger provision allows any charter group to attack a low performing school with a petition drive among parents, bypassing local school boards. But the most dangerous provisions are those that will allow BESE to approve new charters and new voucher schools to spring up and cherry pick students from most local school systems to set up schools that have a performance advantage over local public schools. They will also dump out all their low performers to re-enter public schools. This is just like how the New York Yankees used to guarantee success by buying the best talent. All of this will raid the local MFP. In addition, since the charters and private schools do not have to participate in the teacher retirement system, local school boards will be mandated to pay an even greater contribution to the retirement system to offset the loss of employees. (they are now mandated to pay 25% contribution for each employee)
Educators, this is nothing less than an all out attack on public education and the many dedicated educators who have devoted their lives to the welfare of children. It makes what happened last year in Wisconsin to public education look like childsplay! And what's sad is the Governor's strategists have calculated that the teaching profession in Louisiana is too beat down to fight back! If educators do not go to the capitol on March 15 to tell our legislators how we know this will damage the education of children and ruin many educators' careers we will be partly responsible for the demise of public education in Louisiana.
I will immediately update the information in this blog when we find out more about the legislative agenda for March 15. Please stay informed and be willing to act on a moment's notice.
In addition to setting unscientific and unattainable student achievement goals in a two year period, the ESEA waiver proposal drastically changes the mechanism for calculating school performance scores. (see pages 49 - 61 of the ESEA waiver application). To put it briefly the rating system is changed from a 200 point system to a 150 point system yet the points needed for various letter grades are not reset proportionately. Proportionally the minimum "A" should go from 120 to 90, but the lowest A is set at 100. The new B is 85 to 99.9, the new C is 70 to 84.9, and the new D is 50 to 69.9. The numbers have changed drastically but, not to worry. The Department plans to jury rig the scoring system to end up with just about the same numbers of schools falling in each category of letter grades as with the old system. So this seems to indicate what many suspected all along; that the Department can manipulate the numbers to produce whatever results they choose. For example, there will be a fudge factor in the calculation that will award bonus points for schools that make greater than expected progress with low performing sub groups using the new value added formulas. These are formulas like the Coca-Cola formulas that are kept in a safe that only the statistics gurus at the DOE are allowed to study and adjust. This whole scheme is a process that looks scientific because of the fancy formulas, but is really pseudo science used to produce a predetermined result. So local school administrators will only know how it works after the results have been determined.
All schools other than A schools will be expected to increase their SPS by 10 points each year (proportionally this would be like 13.3 points on the old system) so that the state can seem to be progressing to 100% proficiency in only two years. This goal will be unattainable for most schools. No one in the field now really knows what sanctions may result from not attaining these goals.
Now lets look at the main thrust of the attack on public education and teachers:
Part II Legislation, MFP, Vouchers and Charters: (See Diane Ravitch's article on the same legislation linked here)
The major campaign against public education began with a drastic change in the MFP last week by the Jindal controlled BESE. According to the new formula, numerous special schools, charters, and voucher schools will now be able to raid the funding from public schools according to the number of students they gain. One major legal concern is that since the private schools will also raid the component of MFP coming from local taxes that the voters may have approved for specific purposes, this may not be allowed by the constitution. Local school Boards along with the LAE and LFT are encouraged to adopt the LSBA resolution to authorize and pursue an immediate legal challenge.
HB 974 and SB 603 which may be heard in the Senate Education Committee in a full day meeting next Thursday, March 15 will be the big push for destruction of job security for all teachers, principals, and even superintendents! When combined with the implementation of the Act 54 evaluation and the accountability changes described above, these bills (they are identical versions of House and Senate bills) will basically make every educators' job dependent on the student achievement of unrealistic academic goals and could demoralize the teaching profession.
The new legislation will immediately eliminate the normal tenure process for any new teachers and nullify tenure for thousands of experienced teachers. Tenure is ended as soon as a teacher gets one ineffective evaluation. Also, the Act 54 evaluation, in the first year of operation, could put thousands teachers on a path to dismissal because of the mandatory 10% failure factor. This number will only grow by thousands each year as the 10% factor is applied again and again. That's because the evaluation plan for teachers described in that ESEA Waiver will mandate that the bottom scoring 10% of teachers get an evaluation of "ineffective" no matter what local administrators believe about their teachers' effectiveness. This is further complicated by the fact that 66% of teachers in Louisiana are teaching non-tested subjects. It is not clear if the 10% failure factor will be applied to the teachers of non-tested subjects. No one has figured out a practical and equally rigorous way of applying value added goals to these teachers. But who cares?
The Principal's evaluation will also depend partially on the number of teachers rated "ineffective" and principals will be trapped by a "catch 22" situation. If the principal applies the (COMPASS) in too strict a manner, too many teachers will get "ineffective" and the principal is in trouble. If the principal grades teachers too easy and the value added portion shows up poor or negative for the unique student gains expected of each teacher, then the State Department will send an investigation team out to find out why those teachers are not being properly punished! (I'm just guessing on that part). All indications are that the ACT 54 evaluation will produce many erratic and incorrect teacher evaluation results. How can anyone justify tampering with the job security of professional educators in this frivolous manner? Local school boards will have no more say in these issues than the BESE Board has in dealing with Jindal and White.
My readers are sophisticated intelligent people. You know what will happen if HB 976 and SB 597 (The charter and voucher expansion bills) pass. This will introduce a major conflict between privatization forces and local school boards. The parent trigger provision allows any charter group to attack a low performing school with a petition drive among parents, bypassing local school boards. But the most dangerous provisions are those that will allow BESE to approve new charters and new voucher schools to spring up and cherry pick students from most local school systems to set up schools that have a performance advantage over local public schools. They will also dump out all their low performers to re-enter public schools. This is just like how the New York Yankees used to guarantee success by buying the best talent. All of this will raid the local MFP. In addition, since the charters and private schools do not have to participate in the teacher retirement system, local school boards will be mandated to pay an even greater contribution to the retirement system to offset the loss of employees. (they are now mandated to pay 25% contribution for each employee)
Educators, this is nothing less than an all out attack on public education and the many dedicated educators who have devoted their lives to the welfare of children. It makes what happened last year in Wisconsin to public education look like childsplay! And what's sad is the Governor's strategists have calculated that the teaching profession in Louisiana is too beat down to fight back! If educators do not go to the capitol on March 15 to tell our legislators how we know this will damage the education of children and ruin many educators' careers we will be partly responsible for the demise of public education in Louisiana.
I will immediately update the information in this blog when we find out more about the legislative agenda for March 15. Please stay informed and be willing to act on a moment's notice.
Thursday, March 1, 2012
The Need to Empower Educators
Important Notice 3/5/12: Jindal Education Reform Legislation Introduced; Please click on the following bill numbers to read the full text of the Jindal legislaton to expand vouchers and charters and nullify tenure, add merit pay and fire teachers. HB 976 and SB 597 are House and Senate versions of the charter/voucher bills. HB 974 and SB 603 are House and Senate versions of bills that shift teacher firing authority to Superintendents and make teacher and administrator firing, loss of tenure, merit pay, and loss of certification dependent on achievement of unrealistic student goals. Please review these bills and prepare to contact your legislators since this package is expected to be the first order of business at the Legislature starting March 12. The Jindal plan is to rush these bill through before educators have time to tell their legislators how damaging these bills are to public education and to teachers and administrators. I will add analysis on this soon.
Something happened last week in Louisiana public education that went completely under the radar of the news media. It happened without the knowledge of and consultation with most professional educators in the field. Our Governor and new State Superintendent have taken pains to pay lip service to the idea of empowering school principals and teachers, yet the changes in policy this week continue the trend of mandating unsound education goals and practices without considering the legitimate concerns of the educators in the field. I believe this week's changes in policy will only undermine public support for public education and demoralize public school educators. The policy changes came about as a result of a somewhat obscure 131 page proposal by the LDOE to request ESEA flexibility and waivers of the No Child Left Behind requirements.
This proposal was submitted to the US DOE without a vote of BESE and without the opportunity for public discussion. The only information shared by the LDOE with local educators was a slick Power Point show presented to Superintendents and the Accountability Commission that did not divulge the choices available to Louisiana in requesting the ESEA flexibility and waiver.
In my opinion, the most disappointing component of Louisiana's ESEA Flexibility Request and waiver of No Child Left Behind was that the request did not take advantage of the most helpful change in rules offered to us on a silver platter by Arne Duncan and the US DOE! If you have followed this blog in the past you are familiar with the concern of many educators about the impracticality of the NCLB requirement for 100% proficiency of all children in English language arts and math by the year 2014. But this is the option (Option C) chosen by Superintendent White and our DOE as part of the waiver request. And to add insult to injury, the LDOE implied that educators in the schools agree with this impossible requirement! See the statement on page 65 of the linked document: “Louisiana remains committed to the AMOs established several years ago, which set yearly growth targets aimed towards 100 percent of children in the state attaining proficiency by 2014.”
On page 62 of the flexibility application, the US DOE had allowed Louisiana to choose between three options for setting student achievement goals according to the following:
"2.B SET AMBITIOUS BUT ACHIEVABLE ANNUAL MEASURABLE OBJECTIVES
Option A reads: "Set AMOs in annual equal increments toward a goal of reducing by half the percentage of students in the 'all students' group and in each subgroup who are not proficient within six years.”
Our LDOE passed up this opportunity in favor of a PR choice (Option C) that may end up putting a failure label on 90% of our public schools across the state by 2014. So much for the empowerment of local principals and teachers.
The Department tries to hedge this foolish choice by calling the goal of 100% proficiency an “aspirational” goal. But the USDOE did not ask for an aspirational goal. They asked for “ambitious but achievable annual measurable objectives.” If you look at the table submitted by the LDOE on page 62, you will see that the AMOs for the years 2012, 2013, and 2014 are not achievable in the real world.
My concern is this: If we lie to the public about what is achievable in public education, aren't we setting up our schools for an unnecessary perception of failure in the eyes of the public? Would a doctor guarantee every patient a cure of his ailment regardless of the other factors in the environment affecting that patient's health? Yet that's what we are doing in Louisiana public education.
Do you really care about being empowered as a professional educator? Then why not make your concerns known to the US Department of Education by sending an email to the Department indicating which choice you believe Louisiana should make in its NCLB waiver application? The Louisiana Association of Educators (click on this link to see the LAE letter to the LDOE and the USDOE) has made its concerns known to the USDOE, but one group is not enough. The USDOE needs to hear from individual administrators, principals and teachers. If you agree, just copy the following email address: ( ESEAflexibility@ed.gov.) and use it to submit your own email on this subject to the US DOE. I suggest you include your name, position, and the name of your school if you want it to be taken seriously.
I hope many educators and even parents will email their concerns on this matter directly to the USDOE.
On Wednesday March 7 this blog will discuss other important details in the Waiver Request which will also affect every public school in the state.
Something happened last week in Louisiana public education that went completely under the radar of the news media. It happened without the knowledge of and consultation with most professional educators in the field. Our Governor and new State Superintendent have taken pains to pay lip service to the idea of empowering school principals and teachers, yet the changes in policy this week continue the trend of mandating unsound education goals and practices without considering the legitimate concerns of the educators in the field. I believe this week's changes in policy will only undermine public support for public education and demoralize public school educators. The policy changes came about as a result of a somewhat obscure 131 page proposal by the LDOE to request ESEA flexibility and waivers of the No Child Left Behind requirements.
This proposal was submitted to the US DOE without a vote of BESE and without the opportunity for public discussion. The only information shared by the LDOE with local educators was a slick Power Point show presented to Superintendents and the Accountability Commission that did not divulge the choices available to Louisiana in requesting the ESEA flexibility and waiver.
In my opinion, the most disappointing component of Louisiana's ESEA Flexibility Request and waiver of No Child Left Behind was that the request did not take advantage of the most helpful change in rules offered to us on a silver platter by Arne Duncan and the US DOE! If you have followed this blog in the past you are familiar with the concern of many educators about the impracticality of the NCLB requirement for 100% proficiency of all children in English language arts and math by the year 2014. But this is the option (Option C) chosen by Superintendent White and our DOE as part of the waiver request. And to add insult to injury, the LDOE implied that educators in the schools agree with this impossible requirement! See the statement on page 65 of the linked document: “Louisiana remains committed to the AMOs established several years ago, which set yearly growth targets aimed towards 100 percent of children in the state attaining proficiency by 2014.”
On page 62 of the flexibility application, the US DOE had allowed Louisiana to choose between three options for setting student achievement goals according to the following:
"2.B SET AMBITIOUS BUT ACHIEVABLE ANNUAL MEASURABLE OBJECTIVES
Option A reads: "Set AMOs in annual equal increments toward a goal of reducing by half the percentage of students in the 'all students' group and in each subgroup who are not proficient within six years.”
Our LDOE passed up this opportunity in favor of a PR choice (Option C) that may end up putting a failure label on 90% of our public schools across the state by 2014. So much for the empowerment of local principals and teachers.
The Department tries to hedge this foolish choice by calling the goal of 100% proficiency an “aspirational” goal. But the USDOE did not ask for an aspirational goal. They asked for “ambitious but achievable annual measurable objectives.” If you look at the table submitted by the LDOE on page 62, you will see that the AMOs for the years 2012, 2013, and 2014 are not achievable in the real world.
My concern is this: If we lie to the public about what is achievable in public education, aren't we setting up our schools for an unnecessary perception of failure in the eyes of the public? Would a doctor guarantee every patient a cure of his ailment regardless of the other factors in the environment affecting that patient's health? Yet that's what we are doing in Louisiana public education.
Do you really care about being empowered as a professional educator? Then why not make your concerns known to the US Department of Education by sending an email to the Department indicating which choice you believe Louisiana should make in its NCLB waiver application? The Louisiana Association of Educators (click on this link to see the LAE letter to the LDOE and the USDOE) has made its concerns known to the USDOE, but one group is not enough. The USDOE needs to hear from individual administrators, principals and teachers. If you agree, just copy the following email address: ( ESEAflexibility@ed.gov.) and use it to submit your own email on this subject to the US DOE. I suggest you include your name, position, and the name of your school if you want it to be taken seriously.
I hope many educators and even parents will email their concerns on this matter directly to the USDOE.
On Wednesday March 7 this blog will discuss other important details in the Waiver Request which will also affect every public school in the state.
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