A gulf between teachers and the public on what works best in our schools, including merit pay and end to tenure
A new survey shows a gulf between the broader public and teachers on the best ways to improve America’s schools. (It is a gulf we often see here on the blog between parent posters and teachers.)
The fourth annual survey by Harvard’s Program on Education Policy and Governance and Education Next found that while the public supports merit pay for teachers, teachers strongly oppose it. (And we clearly see that on the blog.)
Conversely, while the public opposes teacher tenure, teachers favor it. And teachers are more opposed to the federal Race to the Top program, from which Georgia just won $400 million yesterday.
As usual, Americans think that public schools are bad, except their own.
Among the noteworthy findings:
- Only 18 percent of survey respondents give public schools an “A” or a “B.” More than one-quarter of respondents give the nation’s schools a “D” or an “F.” Only 28 percent of teachers give the nation’s schools an “A” or a “B,” while 55 percent give them a “C” and 17 percent a “D” or “F.”
- The grades improve, however, when people are asked about their own schools. About 65 percent give their local elementary school the highest grades; 55 percent do so for their local middle school. Only 6 percent assign their local elementary school a “D” or and “F,” while 12 percent assign those low grades to their local middle school.
- Support for basing a teacher’s salary, in part, on student academic progress on state tests rose, increasing from 44 percent in 2007 to 49 percent in 2010, while opposition declined from 32 to 25 percent. However, only 24 percent of teachers support the idea.
-Those who oppose teacher tenure outnumber those who support it by a margin of almost 2:1. Forty-seven percent oppose the idea, while 25 percent favor it. But among teachers, 48 percent favor tenure.
-Thirty-two percent of Americans think Race to the Top is necessary to improve education, but 22 percent believe it is an intrusion into local government. However, 46 percent of those polled had no opinion. Teachers oppose RttT by a 2:1 margin, with only 22 percent saying they like the program.
-There was a surge in support for virtual schooling. Between 2009 and 2010, the percentage in favor of allowing high school students to take an online course increased from 42 percent to 52 percent, while opposition fell from 29 percent to 23 percent.
-Support for charter schools remained essentially unchanged between 2008 and 2010 —rising from 42 percent to 44 percent, while opposition increased from 16 to 19 percent. The remaining group—36 percent— remained neutral. Among teachers, charter support fell from 47 percent to 39 percent.
- Support for school vouchers has fallen. While 45 percent of the American public supported vouchers in 2007, only 31 percent did so in 2010.
-Fifty-eight percent of the public thought states should toughen their testing and standards, but only 33 percent of teachers felt that way.
-More Americans (62 percent) believe Congress should continue testing requirements in math and reading than oppose the idea (12 percent), with 26 percent taking a neutral position. But only 50 percent of teachers supported maintaining these requirements.
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126 comments Add your comment
South Ga Teacher180
August 25th, 2010
1:14 pm
I think each school system should have their own merit system based on the revenues they collect in their local area. I like the pay for performance model that was used in Ga back in the early 1990’s where the school was awarded money and the principal gave the faculty discretion on how to use the funds.
Tony
August 25th, 2010
1:14 pm
Imagine if we ran hospitals and doctors offices based on public opinions.
Tonya T.
August 25th, 2010
1:24 pm
Tony: THANK YOU!!
My last job was in education (not in the classroom though). I’ve worked since I was 15, but never in a public sector before then. The sheer amount of crap that employees in the education sector must take from the public is crazy. And the perceptions are so skewed you wonder where in the world they get their information from.
I know PLENTY of sub-standard doctors, lawyers, and accountants —but they never get called on the carpet. heck, a teacher can lose their certificate for a Facebook post but a doctor can be found guilty of malpractice and go on to practice for 20 more years.
And who is being surveyed? What is the SES, ethnic, and age makeup of the respondents? How many have children (or grandchildren) in public schools and regularly visit or volunteer in the schools? As I’ve been told before, perception is reality absent any other evidence.
Hey Teacher
August 25th, 2010
1:36 pm
I had a parent ask me yesterday if I could call her every time her son didn’t turn in an assignment. What I was thinking was “would you like fries with that too”. What I said was that she could check the online parent gradebook system for that information because with over 100 students it would be impossible to make that offer to everyone.
Tony — absolutely correct. In my district, we are not viewed as professionals (would you call your doctor at home?)
Tonya T.
August 25th, 2010
1:41 pm
@hey Teacher:
Why can’t she just check his planner like I do? I continue to sign off on it (my son is a new 6th grader) just to show the teachers and my child I give a dang. Or the teachers’ websites available on the school webpage?
jj
August 25th, 2010
1:45 pm
Teachers don’t mind accountability, their problem stems from 100% accountability with only a fraction of time actually in their control. A little math….Let’s say the teacher has a student for 2 hours a day, times 175 days = 350 hours a year. 365 days x 24 hours = 8760 hours per year. 365 / 8760 = 3.99% of the year. Name one profession where less than 4% of input equals 100% of responsibility.
I am not a teacher and am the first to admit it is not a job I would be good at, but we need to stop chasing away the ones who are good at it.
LLL
August 25th, 2010
1:49 pm
What are the reasons for teacher tenure? Why should parents and the general public want teachers to have the tenure system?
Maybe I’m wrong, but many (most?) hospitals and doctors offices are not run by the tax money. Since the public provides the money – even those who don’t have children attending schools – I think they have the right to, at minimum, voice their opinions.
HS Teacher
August 25th, 2010
1:49 pm
With the economy and the education budget crunch, teachers can no longer be expected to cater to every whim of the students or parents. We are not the parents of these students, we are their teachers.
In high school, we teach specific content areas. We do not feed them, clothe them, etc. We should not have to teach them manners. We should not have to continuously remind them to do their work. We should not have to sign off on every planner for every student. They MUST be STUDENTS. They must be responsible and accountable for their own work and their own actions.
Sorry, but teachers simply cannot be everything to everyone all of the time.
Hey Teacher
August 25th, 2010
1:54 pm
Tonya — one would THINK that would be the logical solution (I also keep a web cite) but this parent wanted more personal service. I routinely get blasted from parents when I don’t answer e mails within the hour (even though I’m supposed to be teaching their children).
HS Teacher, Too
August 25th, 2010
1:57 pm
Society does expect too much from teachers. Whenever there is an idea for the ‘community’ the responsibility inevitably falls into the laps of the schools. This is not right because the schools do not suddenly get more money to accomplish the new task. Schools must just force teachers to work more hours for free.
Bus duty after school? Kids miss the bus because they were fooling around (smoking behind the building) so the teacher must stay with the kids until their parents come to pick them up. Add another 2 hours to the teachers day.
After school programs? Make the teachers ‘volunteer’ to help the kids because their parents certainly want to delay picking them up. Add another hour to the teachers day.
Parents have an early shift at work? Make the teachers ‘volunteer’ to come in early so that the parents can drop off their offspring. Add another hour to the teachers day.
Wonder why GA test scores are decreasing? Really, you wonder? Think about the teacher that spends 12 hours a day at the school but is only given thirty minutes to really plan their lesson. Will she do a good job? Ya think?
Tonya T.
August 25th, 2010
2:01 pm
@LLL
Teacher tenure was originally set in place so that they could not be terminated at the whims of administration (for a variety of reasons). Teacher tenure really doesn’t exist in GA, at least not the way that it was intended to. Here it mostly promises a fair hearing if you are terminated so you can state your case.
Most hospitals and doctors offices are funded with public monies in the form of medicare, medicaid, heck even the student loans doctors take to get through school. And people actually have a personal relationship or interaction with these facilities, yet they act far less superior when speaking about their knowledge of them. How many people believe their doctor knows best, regardless if he/she graduated cum laude or last in their class?
Many teachers would be open to a change in so-called tenure for better pay, but that ain’t gonna happen. Education, although the foundation of civilized society and American global dominance, is ran on the cheap for the most part. At least where it counts, which is in the actual classroom.
justbrowsing
August 25th, 2010
2:01 pm
Education has been falsely marketed to the public for PR reasons. The reality of education in Georgia is that teachers who are liked are those who keep their jobs, while those who are disliked would lose them with tenure taken away. If you thought education was bad in Georgia because of the “who you know” mentality, remove tenure and parents would most definitely see worse.
Lisa B.
August 25th, 2010
2:03 pm
I think the word “tenure,” is misunderstood. In Georgia, teachers become “tenured” after they sign a fourth teaching contract in the same school system. “Tenure” simply means that teachers must be allowed a hearing if they are fired. Non-tenured teachers may be fired without reason, and with no explanation. When I worked in the private sector, I earned the right after one year, to receive an explanation if fired. Tenure does not mean teachers are guaranteed a job forever. In reality, teachers earn the right to due process after three years.
HS Teacher, Too
August 25th, 2010
2:03 pm
@LLL -
The purpose of teacher tenure for public schools starts with the same purpose it is given in colleges…. for academic freedom.
In college, professors earn tenure after a number of years of proving that they know their subject matter and are not forced to lecture ‘in sync’ with others. The tenured professor is allowed to bring in outside sources and to be more creative with lessons to reach all types of students and to differentiate teaching without fear of repercussion. The same is for public school tenure.
In addition, tenured public school teachers are empowered to speak up against injustices in the school, in particular those by administration. Tenured teachers know that they cannot be fired for calling out the principal that is misusing funds, or the administrator that tells teachers to cheat on the CRCT (see ATL public schools), etc. Without tenure, the ‘big bosses’ know that they can intimidate teachers like sheep to do what they want no matter what.
Does this help?
Doc
August 25th, 2010
2:04 pm
My wife is a teacher at a very good HS in Dekalb County. She works long hours including Saturdays and Sundays. Parents should assume some responsibility for their child’s education. Teachers cannot make your student study or make you check their grades before the end of the year.
Tonya T.
August 25th, 2010
2:04 pm
@HSTeacher, Too
Don’t forget school supplies. But you can’t demand them from students who don’t bring them.
HS Teacher, Too
August 25th, 2010
2:05 pm
@Lisa B. – You are correct in the definition of today’s tenure. However, I think that this topic is about the old definition of teacher tenure.
Been there done that....
August 25th, 2010
2:08 pm
Teachers, I thought, in Ga lost tenure rights about 10 years ago. (Barnes) I also know teachers except responibility over things we can control. I sould control what went on in my room. I could not control anything outside of that. Friends, home, family, and many other factors influence all children in this world.
I believe school choice would improve schools. The poor one would be put out of business.
Been there done that....
August 25th, 2010
2:08 pm
accept
EnoughAlready
August 25th, 2010
2:08 pm
There are many occupations where employee raises, bonuses, etc…. are based upon circumstances they have absolutely no control over. I’ll use my position as an example; I work in Business Intelligence, analyzing the performance of our organization. It’s a huge organization based upon the sale of products we do not own or control the volume produced. There are internal corporate employees and external employees all over the world. The goal is to increase sales (revenue) and keep the expenses down. We have two types of customers (the buyer and the sellers). The number of customers outpaces the school systems in most areas by thousands; just to paint a picture of the size. The internal and external teams include, but are not limited to (Sales, Accounting, Marketing, Technology, Customer Support and BI). We all have to work as a team to meet the expectations and each of our pay is based upon reaching that goal. If we lose a customer, we all take one for the team. My job is to keep an eye on what is happening across the board and it will not matter what happens on the other teams; if I’m not doing my job. I’m paid based upon the performance of our organization and that includes the performance of buyers and sellers.
If our customers are hurting; we are in pain.
HS Teacher, Too
August 25th, 2010
2:13 pm
@Enough Already -
Your example is in no way parallel to education or the job of a teacher.
You work in a TEAM for your customers. A teacher is ALONE in the classroom.
Your teams work impacts your customers directly. A teacher only sees the student a fraction of their day.
Your customers have a desire to succeed. Not all students are motivated to learn.
I could go on, and on, and on.
Tonya T.
August 25th, 2010
2:15 pm
@EnoughAlready
Teamwork is permitted and encouraged on your job; education is not the same racket. trust me. I worked in corporate and education and the differences are vast. You and your internal and external teams work in sync to promote and achieve the goals in the company; nah, not in education. You can know your customer and your target market; learning enough about them to anticipate various behaviors; teachers don’t know who they get or what issues they come with from year to year.
Merit pay is great and I could see it with a year-to-year growth model with pre- and post- testing in aptitude and cognitive development as well as subject knowledge. But the current plan being sold only uses sub-standard standardized testing to measure.
Springdale Park Elementary Parent
August 25th, 2010
2:16 pm
Doctors and lawyers don’t get tenure. It’s a meritocracy. Perform or you’re out. Screw up and you’re out. Maybe you should compare yourselves to college profs instead, except tenure for them is under fire now too.
I think most of us parents are willing to fight for teachers to be free of burdensome, worthless paperwork; to get more planning and grading time, to not have to endure unruly, disruptive students, and especially to have more leverage in dealing with vindictive, petty principals.
But teachers, when you fight the idea of merit pay; when you fight against federal “interference” in education (as if GA is doing such a bang-up job); when you argue for job protections unavailable to 99% of the rest of us, you don’t do yourselves any favors, because it looks like you’re trying to protect the weakest among you, and what we want to do as parents is reward the strongest among you.
EnoughAlready
August 25th, 2010
2:30 pm
Our customers are not in front of us all day long or five days a week; in some cases they are local, state, regional and worldwide. We work very hard to obtain the same goals, but that is rarely the case. Customers usually have their own objectives and since you are all customers, I am sure you are aware of this.
It’s a cop out to say that you can’t know or identify your target audience. I worked in marketing for five years and every group can get information on their customers. Most of your customers are within 20 miles of their local schools, but what’s most important is that they are directed to your classroom each day.
H.S. Teacher TOO – not all customers are motivated to succeed, but we work hard to identify those that are losing ground. In the corporate world, if you lose customers; you go out of business. That’s the big picture in my JOB.
Dekalbite
August 25th, 2010
2:32 pm
DeKalb County Schools have 1 Central office employee for every 5 teachers. If you count our support numbers in, we have 1.25 employees for every teacher. Is it any wonder teachers are stretched to the breaking point and students get less and less in direct instruction services each year? There is absolutely no accountability for the non-teaching employees, and they outnumber teachers and in many instances make on average a substantially higher salary. DeKalb is an extreme example, but all of the other metro systems (notable exception is Decatur City Schools) are top heavy in the admin and support area as well. This has to change.
Tinsel
August 25th, 2010
2:43 pm
Some of you claim to be teachers.
Quiz me this. Are you blogging when you should be teaching?
LLL
August 25th, 2010
2:51 pm
@ Tonya
You must admit that public schools are funded by public money much more than most hospitals and doctor’s offices.
Most general public really don’t see any difference in the quality of education even if teachers are terminated by the whim of an administrator.
@ HS Teachers,
I really don’t see the argument about “academic freedome” applies to K-12 teachers. I suppose some biology teachers in GA might risk their jobs if they teach evolution or social studies teachers teaching anything critical of US foreign policies. But beyond that, I don’t see how a teachers teaching 7th grade math, for example, must have the protection from “academic freedom”. In colleges, particularly at the upper level and graduate level, situations are very different.
Mike
August 25th, 2010
2:53 pm
We tend to forget that teachers deal with ideas and tenure protects ideas. Tenure protects one in its diluted Georgian form from being fired because one spoke up at a faculty meeting and disagreed with something stupid. More administrators would be likely to fire teachers who disagree with them (usually your better teachers anyway) than those who suck as teachers but make no waves. The little that tenure guarantees before one can be summarily dismissed is worth protecting.
Tonya T.
August 25th, 2010
3:10 pm
Not a teacher. At all.
Maybe because I’ve seen the belly of the best, I can identify. Maybe because I have a kid with aspergers who has had some great teachers help him along the way DESPITE his tendencies to irritate the heck out of them, I’m amazed. But most of all because teachers taught me or taught me how to find out everything I know, so I’m forever in their debt.
I’ve seen the inside of the education system. I think there are some bad teachers, but I know bad in each and every class of job on earth. They are no more in classrooms than their are doctors in operating rooms or financial advisers in management firms. The real problem in education is education reform leaving out the very people who are to affect it…the teachers. Although I voted for Obama, I am less than impressed with his performance on educational issues and his choice in the leaders of so-called ‘reform’. He knows as much about K-12 public education that I know about plumbing, and beyond telling you where pipes are located I know nada.
I worked in the corporate sector and the people who advised me how to do my job, the industry leaders who set benchmarks all were IN my field. Not business school leaders, not veterinarians, and dang sure not politicians.
The schools can’t be failing everyone, everywhere and they are not failing all segments of society. So the question needs to be deeper than “What can teachers do?” to change that.
Tonya T.
August 25th, 2010
3:10 pm
I meant ‘belly of the beast’. Sorry
Tonya T.
August 25th, 2010
3:12 pm
By the way, are we speaking of the same general public that continues to believe President Obama is a Muslim or that he isn’t a US citizen? Hmmmmm, interesting
Shar
August 25th, 2010
3:13 pm
As a society we seek to circumscribe behavior to certain norms. Time was, this was done in neighborhoods, in churches, in the many public arenas where we met on more or less equal footing. Most of those arenas are outmoded now, and those that remain are certainly not universal nor egalitarian. Plus, twenty first century adults, regardless of how poorly behaved, react poorly to any effort to infringe upon their “rights” by attempting to restrict behavior.
This has left schools as the big exception. The children have fewer choices when confronted by behavioral requirements, and with education compulsary until age 16, schools are the last near-universal arena where disparate groups can be forced to conform to approved group ethics. Therefore, schools have become the avenue for every social reform of the last forty years, which accounts for all of the various interest groups’ endless efforts to push their own agendas into education as well as the ballooning school budgets and the increased workloads of teachers and administrators. In the process, their educational mission has been all but obscured by the social engineering, and school employees – particularly classroom teachers – have been forced into the role of substitute parents while far too many actual parents consider their job done if their child shows up at the school door.
The teachers on this blog are correct – if they are to be rewarded based upon their students’ academic performance, that is what their responsibility should be limited to. Parents are right, too – taxpayer dollars should be heavily weighted toward those teachers who are the most engaging, motivating and effective in the classroom, and job protections should never shield poor performers. The problem is mission creep: How can teachers earn merit pay for academic excellence when they are expected to compensate for poor policy or curricular decisions and parental abdication?
While free public education is guaranteed until age 18, there is NO guarantee that the public at large will assume the parental responsibilities of shirkers or will give extra perqs to those who demand them the loudest. My kids’ public schools are known throughout the city for the level of parent involvement and the students’ high performance on standardized tests. Having been one of the involved parents, I know that the thousands and thousands of hours and dollars donated for tutoring, school supplies, assistance in the classroom, money and chaperones for enrichment activities etc came from about 35% of the schools’ parents while the remaining 65% coasted on the contributions of others.
In fairness to the students who depend on them and the taxpayers who fund them, teachers deserve the right to be judged and compensated on how well they do their jobs. That means that we as a political entity have to define those jobs as TEACHING, not as social work, and that taxpayers’ investment in future generations be amplified by parents of current students, who are reaping the immediate reward of that investment, by requiring them to donate time and/or money at school and to present their children at the door healthy, rested, with their homework done, fed and ready to behave in such a manner that teachers can teach and students can learn.
EnoughAlready
August 25th, 2010
3:16 pm
Mike
August 25th, 2010
2:53 pm
The rest of the working population doesn’t have “anything” to protect them from being fired if they speak up at a staff meeting. We all have to deal with ugly situations and the fact that not everyone is going to agree or like what we have to say. It’s the facts of life.
@Tinsel
August 25th, 2010
3:16 pm
And what is yuour profession?
@Tinsel
August 25th, 2010
3:17 pm
Maybe you should get back to work or supervising your children or whatever it is you do.
Hey Teacher
August 25th, 2010
3:18 pm
The problem is that most teachers aren’t ever ASKED what we think. BTW, most of my students are on a field trip today, which is the only reason why I have time to respond to this blog before 3:30.
Tonya T.
August 25th, 2010
3:21 pm
Shar:
Your last paragraph says it all. That will never happen and I believe (can’t speak for ALL teachers, just the ones I know) is what makes merit pay so distasteful to educators. In all this hype, you consistently hear that they should be able to reach ALL children regardless of parental involvement or influence (or lack thereof). In addition, the public wants teachers held to higher moral and professional standards than the parents themselves, many times to outlandish levels. Not realistic at all.
The best and the brightest of our graduates don’t go into teaching due to the current conditions. Add another layer upon layer of bureaucracy and the pickings will get even more slim. Because if merit pay becomes the standard and teachers perform up to it, someone has to pay the piper. And we’re struggling to do that with the system as it is.
EnoughAlready
August 25th, 2010
3:29 pm
Tonya T.
August 25th, 2010
3:10 pm
There are many occupations where the boss isn’t necessarily from that field, mine included. Mrs. Obama was a hospital administrator in her last position, but was a lawyer. It is my understanding that she was exceptional in that position. I’m not a farmer, but I have a green thumb. I have a computer science degree and I spend my days performing analysis. My mother was a nurse, but should have been a financial planner. My point is that we can do many things that are outside of what we obtained our undergraduate degrees in, as a career choice.
Tonya T.
August 25th, 2010
3:33 pm
And I can summarily clarify an issue in the comments that seems rampant:
TENURE IN THE STATE OF GEORGIA ONLY MEANS YOU HAVE A RIGHT TO A DISMISSAL HEARING AFTER A FOURTH CONTRACT. IF THE PRINCIPAL WANTS TO REMOVE A TEACHER FOR POOR PERFORMANCE, THEY HAVE EVERY RIGHT TO DO SO BY DOCUMENTING THE ISSUES AND PLACING THE TEACHER ON A PDP (PERFORMANCE DEVELOPMENT PLAN). THIS IS PRETTY MUCH THE SAME AS A WRITE-UP IN THE CORPORATE WORLD. IF THE TEACHER FAILS TO IMPROVE, OUT THE DOOR HE OR SHE WILL GO.
Thank you for your attention. Back to regularly scheduled programming…
Logic
August 25th, 2010
3:34 pm
Hmmm. What if doctors did what the general public thought best? What if hospitals had to take polls of the community in order to service its patients?
Does the public ALWAYS know what’s best?
Why not leave answers to specific questions up to the experts in the field? Or, is that too logical?
Logic
August 25th, 2010
3:35 pm
@Tonya T. (aka the all-caps lady),
We know. That is today’s definition of tenure. We know.
The word ‘tenure’ in this blog is the old definition where teachers had real protection and job security.
Logic
August 25th, 2010
3:37 pm
@Tinsel – Are you unemployed?
@Tinsel
August 25th, 2010
3:39 pm
Nope. I am getting ready to leave school to pick up my children. I am planned up for the week and had a few extra minutes to read/blog.
Tonya T.
August 25th, 2010
3:39 pm
Logic, you know but like the ‘Great Union Myth’ the general public seems to have ZERO knowledge what their talking about. And no matter how many times people type otherwise, the term is still getting thrown around like a volleyball on Labor Day.
Logic
August 25th, 2010
3:47 pm
@Springdale Park Elementary Parent – You are wrong, just plain wrong. Doctors get paid REGARDLESS of their performance. A doctor can be found guilty of malpractice and still practice medicine until retirement. A doctor can ‘kill’ a patient with no repercussions (he died in the operating room). I’ve had a doctor over bill me for work never perform – and if I hadn’t caught it, my insurance was ready to pay up.
Teachers can only do our job – teach. We cannot force someone to learn. Learning is the job of the student. There is a clear difference that you need to understand.
Parents need to help their child understand the job of the student. Period.
If students do not do their job, you CANNOT penalize the teacher with this merit pay crap. If GA goes this route, there will be a mass teacher exodus from this State. What will parents say then when the class sizes average 75?
Good luck with that.
South Ga Teacher180
August 25th, 2010
3:50 pm
I do not have a problem being evaluated by my principal for a bonus or increase in pay…what I have a problem with is some legislature writing and laws that tell me how I am going paid and evaluated….again, the wrong people are making these decisions for us educators.
Logic
August 25th, 2010
3:50 pm
@Tinsel,
So then, if you are a teacher and had time to blog, why do u call out other teachers doing likewise?
HS Teacher
August 25th, 2010
3:54 pm
@South GA Teacher180 -
I agree. I do not mind at all being evaluated for a pay increase. However, do not use other people’s performance (students) to justify it. Use MY performance only!
HS Teacher, Too
August 25th, 2010
3:59 pm
@Enough Already –
I do not see my students “all day long”. I see one student for 55 minutes a day for 180 days a year for one year only.
While you have time to develop relationships with your customers over a long period of time, we do not have that luxury with our students. While your customers may use you exclusively, my students attend 6 classes with 6 different teachers. And so on….
You really need to stop comparing your corporate job to education. It is apples and oranges. You are in no way an expert in education and obviously haven’t a clue on how to improve it.
@Tinsel
August 25th, 2010
4:01 pm
Not me. That was Tinsel asking us what we do. I called her on it. I think that teachers on planning or lunch have every right to blog away. I simply called out Tinsel for askimg teachers why they are blogging when probably he/she is on the job right now, too. It’s a general public thing: “I can blog during work hours, but YOU can’t, teacher…get back to work!”
ABC
August 25th, 2010
4:27 pm
While I don’t think a teacher’s salary should be based 100% on test score (dammit how much I hate tests…I wish they would do away with them altogether! They don’t prove squat), I think it should be some kind of performance based. And like “Enough” said, there are PLENTY of jobs out there that have some percentage of your performance based on things completely outside your control.
For instance. I worked in the corporate office of a major retail company. I was an accountant. I crunched numbers and did financial analysis. 10% of my review was based on sales. SALES!!! I had zero control over sales! I was not a buyer (the people that bought the merchandise that was sold in the stores), I was not in the sales floor EVER, I was not a store manager, supervisor, or anything like that, I was not in advertising or marketing. And yet, 10% of my evaluation was based on whether the company met the sales numbers.
I could argue that a teacher has a whole lot more control over tests results than I did over sales. So let’s say 15-20% of the pay should be based on test scores. The rest? How about parent surveys, peer reviews, how many continuing education courses the teacher took, observations from the principal?
And I remember how much the teachers were complaining about districts cutting costs and firing based solely on seniority. How is that more fair than merit? If you don’t allow merit, you open yourself to be fired over an irrelevant thing like how many years u have been in the district. I think the ones that complain about merit pay just wouldn’t pass muster. The teacher I know wouldn’t care. They know they can hack it.
Fired Up
August 25th, 2010
4:32 pm
Some of the public wants to make parallels between us and other professionals, but they are comparing apples to oranges. As a teacher, I’ve always thought the current pay system made no sense…automatic raises whether I do a good job or not. Some teachers just show up on the job and make little or no impact. They never cause trouble, but they never really offer a service. Yet these kind of teachers work their way up the scale and are less likely to get terminated than really strong, passionate teachers who put their hearts into their professions, but “ruffle feathers” from time-to-time. That never made sense to me, to reward anyone who may just be showing up, but not really teaching (Yes, I’ve seen it.). HOWEVER, evaluate me for what I deliver, but don’t look at a one-shot test. Look at everything that’s happening throughout the year. Make surprise visits to my classroom. Have me collect artifacts throughout the year to demonstrate what I am doing, but DON’T expect to measure the progress of any human being by a yearly test. It’s not fair to us teachers or to our students. So, bring on the merit pay, but offer a fair evaluation.
ABC
August 25th, 2010
4:36 pm
Fired up: completely agree with you. Not test scoring alone, but a combination of ALL the things you mentioned. A good teacher should have nothing to fear with that system. While the ones that just “punch in” would not make it.
me
August 25th, 2010
4:50 pm
@ Been there done that.
Nope, only administrators lost their right to a fair dismissal (Ga tenure). This is why you have so many poor, spineless administrators now. Try managing 100 people with a good bit more job security than you. All too often you either bow and scrape to every new idiot idea or hit the soup kitchen.
Short Timer
August 25th, 2010
4:56 pm
Maureen, Your blog about dress code included a scenario where your daughters do not have eough time to eat lunch. How about some more investigation into that topic. I am in a trailer that is about 5 minutes away from the cafeteria and my students get twenty minutes for lunch. Most don’t even get in line, they just sit and socialize. Why are parents not upset about this. Check the research and tell me if this is “what’s best for children, as I constantly hear from administrators. I am always told that we have looked at the data, but that is usually only when it puts more n the teachers and less on administration.
Dan
August 25th, 2010
4:59 pm
Nicely stated fired up
@ABC no an accountant doesn’t have control over sales, but rather having a stake in the sales allows your compensation to move a bit with the companies success (and I have been in accounting/finance for over 20 years) the same could be done for schools, part of the compensation could be based on the schools success. Nobody works in a vacuum, everyones success depends partly on anothers. Some are anchors some are lifters. As a manager I am evaluated constantly on the performance of my team.
Ole Guy
August 25th, 2010
5:05 pm
Teacher pay should, in absolutely no way whatsoever, be based on test results. Test results should be based, IN THEIR ENTIRETY, on students. To do otherwise takes the monkey off the backs of kids. THEY, and THEY ALONE, should be held accountable for their academic records.
Teachers, on the other hand, could use some UNBIASED periodic professional observations.
All this will be accomplished ONLY when the teacher corps gains unified representation. Until then, teachers will always be relegated to being hand maidens of the DOE…TEACHERS OF GEORGIA, LET’S GET WITH IT!
Dan
August 25th, 2010
5:08 pm
@logic, first of all don’t compare teachers to doctors, there is a world of difference between the effort it takes to become a doctor and teacher, and rightly so. There is too great a need for teachers, you couldn’t possibly fill the need were the bars set at the same height. Your position on merit pay suggests that teachers have no control over the students success. If that were the case why not just hire baby sitters and give the kids text books to read, or I guess since they wouldn’t be able to read…movies. Or perhaps you believe that teachers can take credit for succesful students but not failures??
Nah such a belief would be contradictory to your blog name
catlady
August 25th, 2010
5:29 pm
LLL, let me add to what Tonya T. says. Doctors also profit (in every sense) from the research and work of NIH, CDC, and many, many other tax funded entities.
EnoughAlready: Any of your products ever tell you they will NOT perform, and you can’t get rid of them? Any of your products come to you made of inferior materials, and you can’t discard them? Any of your products try to keep the other products from becoming ready to be picked up by the customers? No? Then your argument is specious.
Dan
August 25th, 2010
5:30 pm
Hypothetical question
If you have 20 kids in a 5th grade math class and in timeline 1 teacher A works with them for a semester. Timeline 2 teacher B works with them.
Would there be a difference in how well those kids knew the material at the end of the semester? Therein lies the answer to merit pay or not to merit pay
Dan
August 25th, 2010
5:35 pm
@catlady
The better the teacher, the less of the product will refuse to perform, the more will be made of the inferior product, and fewer of the products will interfere with the others. Which is the point of merit pay. There is really no cogent argument against merit pay,Except the difficulty in fairly applying it. It is not an easy task. But those that deny all responsibility for failing students simply prove the need for a merit system
Tonya T.
August 25th, 2010
5:44 pm
My question:
How will this reform be funded in an economy where we are struggling to keep teachers on the rolls under the current system? I actually believe, if brought to the table, teachers could buy into merit pay under the right conditions. But how would we fund the increases? The bonuses? If good teachers make more, there will be no real savings from the current pay scale. The money has to come fro somewhere. If the bar is raised for beginning teachers, where will the extra money for starting pay come from? Everybody wants a better product, but no one seems to get that like a Pontiac vs. a Porsche, it come with a higher price tag. One of the reasons GA is at the bottom is we get what we pay for. Is the public willing to pay more?
After the NBCT debacle, I can see why so many educators are wary of buying into anything the public or politicians promise. Just saying…
SWF Seeking Bliss Through Information Not Ignorance
August 25th, 2010
5:53 pm
Reply 2 HS Teacher Too-
Your comment-”…tenured public school teachers are empowered to speak up against injustices in the school, in particular those by administration. Tenured teachers know that they cannot be fired for calling out the principal …, or the administrator … etc. Without tenure, the ‘big bosses’ know that they can intimidate teachers like sheep to do what they want no matter what.”
I am waiting for you to holler “Da Plane, Da Plane!” because you Must Be living on Fantasy Island, HS Teacher Too!
If ever there was proof that “tenure” means “zero” in GA – it would be the CCSD tribunal hearings for it’s tenured non-renewed teachers this summer/August. Ground your “tenure” fantasy in reatlity by reading some of the reports of testimony from CCSD fired “tenured” teachers. The very things you say they (everyone of them a TENURED TEACHER with the CCSD) are “empowered” & “can not be fired for” ARE WHAT THESE TEACHERS HAVE SAID THEY HAVE BEEN FIRED FOR!!!
Additionally, please note that the “big bosses” were serving as fill-in-board-member-tribunal-panelists, as well as, testifying against the non-renewal of contract appealing “tenured” CCSD teachers.
The public assumption that folks seem to believe & hold on to for some reason about teacher “tenure” in our state (when “tenure” as a term concerning employment rights is used in our state) is that once someone has it they are affored some kind of job sercurity. They are not.
A tenured teacher may be more of a nuisance or “pest” to fire than someone that isn’t (due to the right to a “fair dismissal hearing in regards to their non-renewal of employment contract if requested – which usually one doesn’t because being “Non-Renwed” in the teaching profession is the equivalent of being Box Office posion in Hollywood ; therefore most “resign” rather than be “non-renewed”). Firing a “tenured” teacher would involve some action, effort & time, over someone that isn’t tenured – in which firing you takes no action, effort or time (GA is an at-will to hire/at-will to fire state) – is, for the most part, true, in the most literal since, but then again, in the most literal since, WE DON’T HAVE TENURE IN GA & what little residue of the term “tenure” associated with a “fair dismissal” employment right remained for teachers in our state was HOSED OFF this summer/August by the CCSD BOE.
Educator2
August 25th, 2010
5:54 pm
@ Shar- Point taken!! “The teachers on this blog are correct – if they are to be rewarded based upon their students’ academic performance, that is what their responsibility should be limited to. Parents are right, too – taxpayer dollars should be heavily weighted toward those teachers who are the most engaging, motivating and effective in the classroom, and job protections should never shield poor performers. The problem is mission creep: How can teachers earn merit pay for academic excellence when they are expected to compensate for poor policy or curricular decisions and parental abdication?”
@Tonya T – I have said the same thing many times, top. “In addition, the public wants teachers held to higher moral and professional standards than the parents themselves, many times to outlandish levels”.
Devil's Advocate
August 25th, 2010
5:54 pm
Can’t wait for this movie…
http://www.waitingforsuperman.com/
Devil's Advocate
August 25th, 2010
6:25 pm
Things are changing…
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/25/opinion/25friedman.html?_r=1
SWF Seeking Bliss Through Information Not Ignorance
August 25th, 2010
6:40 pm
Additionally, Tonya T- (you did such a good job of clarifying what I failed to read prior to my post, I apologize for redundancy MD & blog readers) May I add that in the CCSD teacher terminations I have read about in the AJC & Marietta Daily Journal (www.mdjonline.com) the teacher doesn’t have to be put on a PDP 2 be let go. A teacher doesn’t even have to have poor performance to be let go. A teacher with performance issue that is on a PDP (Eric Simpson) and improves (but the principal doesn’t like) can be let go…. (see AJC articles on CCSD Elementary School teachers (Science & Special Education) & (Lindley) Middle School teacher (MDJ has more teachers if you want to put “tribunal hearings” into the online paper version search box). It’s horrorifying to me and I believe every word of the teachers. The CCSD used it’s brand new teacher evaluation and it’s first time ever RIF policy to allow principals to fill the halls of their schools with pink slips of teacher they didn’t like this past May. It is shameful & if the CCSD BOE members had a conscience, yes, one between all 7 of them, it was destroyed when they voted for both: (1) the brand-new-never- trialed-still-training-its-evaluators-on-how-2-use-it-during-the-school-year-evaluation-tool (completely omitted YEARS OF SERVICE/TEACHING from being written ANYWHERE on the form -so when they were firing/or voting unanymously to not re-new on the tenured teachers during their non renewed appeal hearings- it wouldn’t matter if the teacher had two years or thirty years of service behind him or her) & (2)Superintendant’s Fred Sanderson, OMG- the- budget- is- due- Reduction- In- Force- on- the- Fly- policy! Some time ago, I came to the conclusion about this Board of Education anyway, they don’t need seven or even a single-shared good conscience to get a good night’s rest-they are vampires!
South Ga Teacher180
August 25th, 2010
6:46 pm
@Devil’s Advocate
August 25th, 2010
5:54 pm
Can’t wait for this movie…
http://www.waitingforsuperman.com/
First of all it is from the director of an Inconvenient Truth…that alone may cause a lot of people not to watch it. The result of DC’s issues are similar to all the large urban schools…the leaders of these schools are taking these policies generated out of the Urban Education agenda which has NO REAL research to suggest that what is being implemented really works…all this agenda does is create more problems such as illiteracy.
This film is propaganda to help change the landscape of education in this country to thinking that all kids must and should go to college. Not everyone will go to college and that is the reality. Propaganda such as this will do nothing more the fire up the base of ignorant folks who want to blame the schools for the short falls in education but in reality it is the politicians, the education think tanks, and the so called “expert” (like those at the DOE and Georgia Partnership) writing policy they know nothing about, especially if they have never taught a performance standard or taught under NCLB. This will only create and paint a tainted image that teachers are bad and it is all their fault that they cannot pass unrealistic tests and that the teacher is the ultimate independent variable in a child’s education….not so…look at the social dynamics that children come from and there is more sociological and psychological research that support this than any spotty education research which is often thrown around in the houses of state legislatures and Washington. It is easy to blame teachers for everything…individual responsibility is a thing of the past…right up there with chivalry.
SWF Seeking Bliss Through Information Not Ignorance
August 25th, 2010
6:55 pm
2 me-
(administrators @ the soup kitchen) I am not aware of any CCSD administrators that were fired – probably because they needed to keep them all on the payroll 2 slander their tenured teachers accessing their fair dismissal right hearings this summer.
And 2 whomever was saying WAAAHHH poor teachers (scarcastically not in solidarity) we don’t get to say poop, stand up for ourselves or others, or do didley either – just like you- in your job environment. So stuff your scarcasm up your sphincter!
Devil's Advocate
August 25th, 2010
7:01 pm
Blah, blah, blah…if you can’t make an impact, don’t teach.
Public Teacher
August 25th, 2010
7:20 pm
@Dan – Just a guess on my part, but I would bet a good chunk of money that you have never been a teacher in any capacity whatsoever in a public school. Would I win that bet?
Public Teacher
August 25th, 2010
7:22 pm
@Devil’s Advocate – Blah, blah, blah… if you cannot properly raise a child with manners and a desire to learn, don’t have sex.
ScienceTeacher671
August 25th, 2010
7:25 pm
We’ve been back at school for 3 weeks now, and already 16% of my students have been absent at least 20% of the time or more.
I can’t teach them if they aren’t in class.
Jordan Kohanim
August 25th, 2010
7:27 pm
Dan,
My students are not “products” that “perform.” They are people.
SWF Seeking Bliss Through Information Not Ignorance
August 25th, 2010
7:31 pm
Dear Dan-
ABSOLUTELY! 100%. I am a teacher that’s okay with merit pay.
But I am going to bring my data to the meeting that’s for darn sure. And that data is going to absence reports, records of parent involvement & support for my academic goals for each child/records of parent’s lack of invovlement & support, SES data for each student, performance data for each child in previous school years on a whole lot of diverse kinds of performance assessments, their medical records, including all mental and physcial exams performed, what they ate for breakfast every day of the school year (might also keep records of lunch & dinner too), how much sleep they received each night (not just school nights) for the entire school year, data on relationship of parents-for example-two parents living in same residence raising children, divorced parents, no father in picture, mom not in picture because she works 24/7),the parent(s) or guardin(s) medical and mental health reports, emotional profiles for students and parents from many sources, amount of time child is permitted to spend watching tv, on computer, playing hand-helds, on phone, IPod etc. – also what is watched, listened to and played, reading level, current reading list, and amount of time spent reading in the household per member per day for entire school year…
I’m going to have to meet the gene pool too; that’s just a flat out given.
I want DNA!
Because, you see that meth using whiskey swilling lollipop sucking cheeto eating permanently stained orange finger tips selling prenatals for cigarette cash teenage pregnant mother over there, – well, that little micracle of hers (and her brothers) could be the sole factor determining whether I get a pay increase or a pay free one year, couldn’t it? I’m just saying…
I’m all for it, I said that didn’t I?
Devil's Advocate
August 25th, 2010
7:37 pm
“Because, you see that meth using whiskey swilling lollipop sucking cheeto eating permanently stained orange finger tips selling prenatals for cigarette cash teenage pregnant mother over there, – well, that little micracle of hers (and her brothers) could be the sole factor determining whether I get a pay increase or a pay free one year, couldn’t it? I’m just saying…”
And that is why so many parents hate teachers, and I can’t say I blame them anymore. What an amazing level of ignorance…
If you don’t recognize that education is the only possible solution to the poor parenting problem, GET OUT OF THE PROFESSION!
Devil's Advocate
August 25th, 2010
7:39 pm
And Jordan, Dan was just referencing a catlady post. Jump her with your righteous indignation…
Tonya T.
August 25th, 2010
7:55 pm
@Devil’s Advocate
Education, by and large, cannot remedy poor parenting. I’ve seen it firsthand, both in my family and the public school system. You will catch some, but not most. It makes for beautiful movies, but has anyone ever asked what happened to the students AFTER the final scene? Seriously, there are so many social factors at play in the lives of students today that is oversimplification and, as stated by another poster, abdication of personal responsibility. 100% of nothing on earth will ever be successful. That’s just statistics 101
A large proportion of the schools that are failing are in predominately minority neighborhoods. To ignore the social fabric of these communities is largely why education is where it is now. As a black woman, I see why so many of these areas have issues, and it is something that must be addressed internally before a band-aid can be put on the wounds to heal.
Devil's Advocate
August 25th, 2010
8:05 pm
The only thing that can address the internal is better education. Nothing else even has a chance, as decades and decades of failed public policy have proven.
K Teach
August 25th, 2010
8:45 pm
Get rid of tenure and help get rid of lousy teachers littering my profession!
is there any wonder?
August 25th, 2010
9:00 pm
Just look at all these posts here. Is anyone surprised that there is a gap between teachers and the general public?
If teachers are powerless as Tonya claims, why do we bother even paying them? I suppose we should just base their pay on how well they baby sit.
Why tenure?
August 25th, 2010
9:36 pm
Having seen teachers be threatened with termination for choosing to become a single parent, only to have an administrator reconsider once they realized the teacher was tenured might chance a few minds on tenure.
Sure it protects some poorer teachers at times, but many times it protects good ones from administrative whims as well.
If
August 25th, 2010
9:43 pm
If education is indeed the savior, the single best thing the public schools could do is teach personal responsibility, but when you set it up so that the school has 100% responsibility to “save” the child, no matter what the does, or to the point doesn’t do, to apply himself, the education system disempowers the very same children they claim they are trying to “save.”
Devil's Advocate
August 25th, 2010
9:49 pm
agreed if – but teachers also need to walk the walk on personal responsibility and accountability if they preach it to their students. And teachers on this blog simply do not…
why?
August 25th, 2010
10:06 pm
Why should teachers be given an extra job protection other people don’t have? Is “tenure” for academic freedom or is it just a job protection mechanism?
Echo
August 25th, 2010
10:07 pm
@ Devil’s advocate…once again your blanket statements about what teachers do or don’t do shows your complete lack of intelligence on this matter. I still think you are an administrator, you sound a lot like one of the morons in my front office.
Devil's Advocate
August 25th, 2010
10:24 pm
And you’re probably one of those terrible teachers who thinks they’re great. Your conspiracy theory mindset is ridiculous.
I have years of experience as a mentor teacher to base my opinions off of. You have your failure Echo.
SWF Seeking Bliss Through Information Not Ignorance
August 25th, 2010
10:35 pm
Dear Satan’s Monkeyl: If YOU don’t recognize that PARENTING is the only solution to this country’s poor parenting’s problem. YOU DIDN’T READ THE OWNERS MANUAL!
Leave some jobs for the parents and the other occupations in the world please!
ADDITIONALLY, IF YOU WERE PAYING ATTENTION YOU WOULD NOTICE WE ARE TALKING ABOUT MERIT PAY HERE – PERFORMANCE PAY- AND WHEN YOU WANT TO TALK MY SALARY – THERE WONT BE ANY OF THIS KUMBAYA GARABAGE – I AM SERIOUS ABOUT MY INCOME AND IT’S POTENTIAL AS ANY OTHER PROFESSIONAL OUT THERE IN THE WORKFORCE (& PARENT EAGER TO GIVE THEIR CHILDREN THE BEST SHE CAN).
IF YOU DON’T REALIZE THAT THE BABY MAKERS NEED TO STEP UP AND PARENT THEIR CHILDREN, THAT IT IS THEIR JOB, NOT A TEACHERS, THAN YOU ARE CORRECT WE DO NEED TO GET OUT THE PROFESSION BECAUSE PEOPLE LIKE YOU THAT SAY EDUCATION IS THE ONLY WAY TO FIX EVERYTHING AND THEN YOU WANT TO HOLD ME ACCOUNTABLE FOR FIXING ALL THAT AND THEN YOU WANT TO TIE MY SALARY TO IT, ARE YOU NUTS? TRY THAT ON ANY OTHER PROFESSIONAL TRY IT!
WHICH DO YOU WANT? YOU WANT ME TO RAISE THEM OR YOU WANT ME TO EDUCATE THEM? WHICH ONE? Hey! We don’t have to be Mother Teresa all the time simply because we are educators. I can’t suckle the country’s students and survive to feed my own! And when it comes to being paid for what I do- I have had it up to here with being expected to close all the gaps I didn’t create. Repair all the broken parts that I didn’t break. And unfortunately, I can’t do it all, I can’t even do some of it well anymore; the some is so much more than any teacher in education now could ever had expected he or she would be doing. I would like to get back to that which is what I do best, all the time, and that is teach my students!
I have had it up to here with having the delusion that all children are alike (notice I did not say equal!) shoved down my throat. That they all can perform at the same level at the same time, when I can’t think of two of anything that meet the same maturation & performance timelines exactly.Yet I am constantly hearing my salary needs to be based on my student’s performance. WELL, I BASE YOUR SALARY AS A PARENT ON HOW WELL YOU CHILDREN SPEAK, BEHAVE, & BECOME PRODUCTIVE MEMBERS OF SOCIETY, OH, PARENTS DON’T GET PAID FOR RAISING THEIR CHILDREN? NO KIDDING? THEN WHY SHOULD MY SALARY BE CONTINGENT UPON THAT IF THEY ARE NOT MY CHILDREN!
BY the way IN MY LIFETIME the generations of parentless or generations of parents without parent skills or parents without parent skills raising children to be parents without parent skills has develped TO THE POINT THAT IT IS NOW CRUCIAL-SO I AM PRETTY SURE I DIDN’T CAUSE IT WITH MY PERSONAL POOR PARENTING NOR MY PARENT’S OR THEIR PARENT”S POOR PARENTING!
Parents don’t hate teachers- just YOU do. Because that is the only reason you are on this blog-EVER! Whatever educational issue that caused you to be like you are – if you have children and they aren’t in private education – you need to get them there- because as a public school teacher, I’m not paid to put up with your mess darling. Nor will I.
Devil's Advocate
August 25th, 2010
10:37 pm
Lord help the poor children that have to deal with your hot mess. You are disgusting.
Devil's Advocate
August 25th, 2010
10:42 pm
I even accept most of your premise, keep your salary, fine. But for those teachers that can do their job and overcome the difficult circumstances, we obviously deserve more money, as we are clearly doing a better job. I would never support merit pay that cut average pay, but I’m all for rewarding excellence. Sorry that you are scared because you wouldn’t make the cut.
Tonya T.
August 25th, 2010
11:08 pm
@is there any wonder?
Last time I caught sight of a couple teachers’ paychecks, I thought that was already in place.
I am saying that much of what is currently going on in the education system is a result of removing teachers as stakeholders in the process of of deciding what education is. Teachers are told what to teach, and often, how to teach it. The content knowledge and pedagogy skills of many great teachers is overlooked in favor of the cure-de-jour of various education consultants. A great many of these consultants are nothing more than snake oil salesman with short-term solutions to long-term problems. Bring teachers to the table, listen to what they have to say, and take it into account when trying to change things. Period. Not union reps, not advocacy organizations, plain ‘ol teachers pulled directly from the classroom. Randomly. Given the the chance to roundtable without repercussions, and the passion that so many have for what they do would shine through.
Many teachers want reform, but it also needs a social aspect. Education is a great equalizer; even I can cave to that admission. But it can not be done in a vacuum. To ignore basic social issues like, food, shelter, and family support are crazy; but that is what the current system does. People talk about Title I schools like they are all equal, but I know Title I schools in some of the best areas in town. Do any of you think those kids fare any worse than non-Title I schools nearby?
I want the public to think critically, instead of bandwagon jumping for solutions without thinking through the details. Reform is a lofty goal, but how do you fund it? If better teachers = better schools, what do you do when the starting and cap pay goes up? What about areas where community and parental involvement remains low, what then? When you get great teachers in a school, do you move them around to poorer-performing schools even if the teachers prove NOT to be the issue? How often? I am pointing out that so very many couldn’t even name the principals of the schools in their local feeder patterns, but have opinions based on what snippets of information they receive from various media sources.
Education reform has come and gone before because the proponents didn’t think these things out. I’m trying to point out what I’ve seen from the inside because I am not going back, so I can speak freely. The zealots on both sides of this issue seems to want to stick their fingers in their ears, no matter how rational the points being made. In recent history, the cowboy mentality has gotten this nation into a heap of trouble, yet we play it the role again and again…
Tonya T.
August 25th, 2010
11:13 pm
@Devil’s Advocate
What you describe is incentive pay. You perform better, you get a bonus or better pay as a result. Merit pay, at least as introduced by the current crop of politicians in the Gold Dome, doesn’t resemble that at all.
Like I said , bring teachers to the table, hammer it out, and get it settled. Enacting with all the animosity teachers have toward the current plan is a recipe for disaster, and the students don’t deserve that.
another comment
August 25th, 2010
11:21 pm
Devil’s Advocate you are the one with the issues. But then you are probablly the Principal at my daughters school that thinks it is acceptable to only play Ghetto Rap music at the Freshman formal. You probably condone the parents who allow the failing children to have their T-mobile phones and chat and text through class. These same free lunchers are allowed to get away with never paying their dues for the Sports teams or Cheerleading, or bring the meals, work concensessions, after all the white ones will pay and work the shifts. Whitey doesn’t spend $300 on hair weaves/braids and $50 a week on acyclic nails so they can afford to support the teams. The entitlement crowd just knows don’t pay, they will let you keep on playing, they did last year and the year before.
Put up or shut up moment
August 25th, 2010
11:38 pm
Has there every been a time, once ever, that a major educational leader said that they will empower teachers with the authority to maintain discipline and hold students accountable for their work and behavior in exchange for giving up tenure?
We don’t hold firefighters accountable for putting out fires then refuse them the use of water, do we?
Don't hate the success
August 25th, 2010
11:43 pm
Don’t you all know, because of the high expectations Devil’s Advocate has, that six of Devil’s Advocate’s former students went on to become Supreme Court justices and three have become the first women president of the United States?
SWF Seeking Bliss Through Information Not Ignorance
August 26th, 2010
12:28 am
Dear “we are clearly doing a better job” & “we obviously deserve more money”,
Since my first year of teaching; I have always believed that Special Education teachers should be paid more for “do(ing) their job and overcome(ing) the difficult circumstances”. And to this day, I still believe that. I believe that 100%. I believe that should happen before a regular education teacher, like myself, ever received a “reward of excellence”. And oddly enough, if we are rewarded for excellence – “more money” (to use your words) based on student’s test scores; I don’t know how many of our excellent & deserving teachers in special education would ever get a reward (current education policy).
Again, your efforts of trying to blur your transparency & sound intelligent @ the same time are failing you. You are not a teacher! (But you are a misogynist!) Notice how you loudly bang on about money and rewards, where I do not! (Additionally, I don’t use test scores to declare my student’s excellence – (that is just so unatural & foreign a concept to me – all my students are excellent to me!) why would I expect them to be used to declare if I should receive a larger salray for a year).
As teachers, we didn’t pursue education (and to be honest, since a very young age, I think it pursued me in many ways-very good ways-great ways-born to teach epiphanies), expecting to make ceiling breaking salaries or to receive monetary rewards (I didn’t grow up in a era where students received money for grades either). The teaching experience makes it all worth it – regardless of salary level. The rewards come from my students and their parents too! They aren’t deposited in my checking account; they are deposited in my heart.
Lynn43
August 26th, 2010
1:37 am
I heard a speaker at a Board of Education conference who made this comparison. If I could remember his name, I would give him credit. He tells this story. A man who worked in an ice cream factory was given the task of producing an award winning ice cream, and if he did, he would receive all kinds of awards. The only thing he was responsible for was putting the ingredients together. To try to make this award winning ice cream, the company gave him sour milk, very old lumpy sugar, rotten eggs, and a few good flavorings. Needless to say, this man could not solve the problem of sour milk and rotten eggs, and certainly won no awards.
Was it the ice cream makers fault that he couldn’t turn sour milk into fresh milk or rotten eggs into fresh eggs. Even though he was the best ice cream making in the factory, he could not overcome the circumstances over which he had no control
The same is true for teachers. This (buzz word) achievement gap is going to continually get worse until the “powers that be” face what the REAL reason for this gap and deal with it. Money and putting teachers and student under stress is not going to help. Please deal with the real problem.
Are you serious?
August 26th, 2010
2:01 am
Still awake, can’t sleep. I have already figured our from my diagnostic tests that this is going to be a tough one. Oh no, majority nonreaders; and they want me to work a miracle. Maybe if I try more graphic organizers and more quizzes like the test. One is brilliant; got to figure out what to do with him so he won’t get bored. Two tried to fight as they came into my room and they were talking about fights elsewhere. One just showed up in class today, she’s already 2 1/2 weeks behind. I know I taught this last week, they’re acting like it’s Greek. You won’t me to repeat it again? Please put your cell phone away. Let’s try it again…this is the x axis and this is the y axis. That doesn’t look like a curve. Do you have kids? My baby daddy got put in jail. Can you please put your head up? Why I got to read this? This is boring. He threw that paper at me. So you’re saying that this point represents growth which can also be illustrated with a rightward shift of the LRAS curve? What is he talking about? Where you think you at? This ain’t Harvard! Can I go? It’s an emergency. Please stop shooting at the trashcan. Let me have that cell phone.
Still can’t sleep. Got to go back and try again. 25 personalities, all with various learning styles…let me see
Are you serious?
August 26th, 2010
2:24 am
Figured “out”…it’s late.
Are you serious?
August 26th, 2010
2:29 am
You “want” me to repeat…
Hey, just thought of a new plan. Let me work on this now…maybe I can keep them on task and make them learn something in spite of themselves…maybe.
Devil's Advocate
August 26th, 2010
6:34 am
Misogynist? Huh? Do you even know what that word means? Because that is the last thing I am. And from your last post SWF, you come across as having multiple personality disorder. You can’t have it both ways with your love/hate of all thinngs education.
@another comment – Just ccome out and say what you really feel about black people, the transparency from one of you sad racists would be refreshing.
Elizabeth
August 26th, 2010
9:02 am
Define” highly motivated” and “dynamic”.To me this means teachers who do all of the cutsie group projects, spoonfeed the kids by giving them “fun” activities, and the teachers who can make the students “like ” them. The kids and parents may be happy now but what about later? Thank God most of my teaching career came before merit pay because I was NOT a congenial playground teacher. I taught a subject–Language Arts_-and I expected my students to read the book for themselves rather than reading it out loud to me or each other; write the essay once a week by themselves in class instead of at home where their parents could do it for them; think and analyse literature rather than doing a “Guided Reading worksheet” in which the questions are given IN ORDER and never require thought– just regurgitation of information. For that I was vilified by students and parents until my 9th graders reached 10 th grade and my 8th graders reached 9th grade. Then the parents and students came back in droves to thank me for how well I had prepared them for the next grade. My wise first principal told me that I was the kind of teacher that was never appreciated by parents, students or colleagues( who thought I was was mean) until years after I had taught them. So I would get fired today for not being a sweet easy teacher who did not teach in a “motivating ” way. Yet kids I taught the passed the CRCT after failing it every other year they were in school. Several of my students made perfect scores on the 8th and 11th grade writing assessments. In general, my students did well on the SAT and in college largely because of the rigor I demanded in my classroom. Rigor was not always fun or cutsie, but I did my job and did it well. I will never be a teacher of the month or year because I am unpopular with the ones who make those decisons. But in the end, a student who hated my class said it all when she told her mother ( who told me) ” I miss Mrs. _____. She really taught me something”. But if were judged today on my teaching style, I would fail miserably. I am not a salesperson or a performer. I AM A TEACHER.
Another view
August 26th, 2010
9:12 am
Thank you Elizabeth.
Devil's Advocate
August 26th, 2010
11:57 am
Elizabeth – that is just silly, pity-me, baseless speculation.
It sounds like you would always be a teacher that is highly valued and who would make the grade for merit pay easily. Stop feeling so sorry for yourself.
LLL
August 26th, 2010
1:06 pm
I think there are a lot of educators who are holding on to this illusion that students will appreciate what they did after they leave their classrooms. Unfortunately, it is just an illusion.
It is also amazing to see the contrast between those teachers who complain about not being able to make any difference because their students come from the home with no parental support and a teacher who takes credit of all the success of her students after just taking one (or maybe two) class with her…
Anna
August 26th, 2010
2:16 pm
Teachers, if not student performance, on what criteria should you be judged? I personally do not think you should be judged on student performance ONLY because the “student performance” is a result of moronic standardized tests created by morons at the state level who are handing $millions$ to test-creating companies. I do think how well your students do should be part of your success criteria, but I’m thinking more of something like “how far did this student make it this year” instead of “did they make it to a random benchmark or pass/fail an irrelevant test”. What else? Surely you don’t want this decision brought down entirely to the local level. Aren’t there as many tyrannical, unmotivated, or just plain stupid principals as there are county and state administrators? I know the principal at our school is incomprehensibly lazy. As a teacher, there is no way I would want the buck to stop with her. What completely objective data is acceptable to teachers as a measuring stick?
LLL
August 26th, 2010
2:24 pm
@ Anna,
So, how do you propose to measure “how far did this student make it this year” without pre- and post-testing the students?
Anna
August 26th, 2010
3:16 pm
@LLL. I thought I made it clear I wasn’t against measuring the students, but I don’t think the tests they are using today are any good. Even the teachers on this blog hate the tests – typos, content, disorganization, and not grade-level appropriate for the youngest ones. Besides, they’re not going to take ITBS or CRCT (which cannot be compared to each other) twice a year. Yes, students should be tested, and teachers should be graded based on their students, but neither should be a blanket across all schools, grades, or even classes, given the differentiation that exists among students in all of those environments. I am asking the teachers what kind of tests they think would be good (b/c, again, you can’t give national standardized tests twice a year) to measure students and then also what other criteria they think their job performance should be based on.
South Ga Teacher180
August 26th, 2010
4:19 pm
ScienceTeacher671
August 25th, 2010
7:25 pm
We’ve been back at school for 3 weeks now, and already 16% of my students have been absent at least 20% of the time or more.
I can’t teach them if they aren’t in class.
_____________________________________________________________
Remember, you are still accountable ( insert sarcasm here)!!
SWF Seeking Bliss Through Information Not Ignorance
August 25th, 2010
7:31 pm
Totally liking the cheeto analogy! I get that!!! LOL!
Devil’s Advocate
August 25th, 2010
8:05 pm
The only thing that can address the internal is better education. Nothing else even has a chance, as decades and decades of failed public policy have proven.
_______________________________________________________________________
My point exactly…teachers do not create public policy! They react to it so they can feed their families.
@ Anna
August 26th, 2010
4:41 pm
If you want a test that is valid and reliable, then it would take $$$ to develop it. If you want the test to be more open, that is, all items are to be released after every administration, it will cost even more $$$. You can’t just have teachers make their own tests and use them for the purpose of evaluating them, either. You WILL have to use a standardized tests that are catered to the specific state standards – until we fully implement the Common Core State Standards – and even then only in math and language arts.
high school teacher
August 26th, 2010
7:25 pm
I am a little disturbed by some of the teacher comments. First of all, I do establish a relationship with my students. Granted, it’s not easy to do with 135 students that I see for 53 minutes each day, but it’s my job. I also contact parents if students have missing assignments. They are still the legal guardians of the CHILD who is sitting in my class. Our principal requires us to make 5 parent contacts every week. It’s my job. I have found that when I make those calls early in the year, I don’t have to make as many later on. If you don’t want to establish a relationship with your students, go teach college.
SWF Seeking Bliss Through Information Not Ignorance
August 26th, 2010
8:24 pm
Dear Lynn43-Thanks for sharing. Not heard the ice cream tale before-I like the imagery of it. I think it would make a wonderful’s children’s story book with illustrations-it makes sense about so many things that children end up beating themselves up over too -that they have no control over.
Again, thanks for sharing. (4 sum entirely sappy reason it’s made me cry, i don’t know why)
SWF Seeking Bliss Through Information Not Ignorance
August 26th, 2010
8:49 pm
Dear HS teacher-
what you are speaking about it a given. of course.
that’s not what I am speaking to
additionally, parent(s) as my student’s legal gaurdin is not necessary the case with the student’s I teach at all- but yes, whomever, I am not referring to something as simple as “teacher contact” with parent. I’d like you to know that – if it matters.
thanks
SWF Seeking Bliss Through Information Not Ignorance
August 26th, 2010
8:58 pm
Elizabeth- noooo. You teaching style is valued. That’s the thing I like about a teaching team because we are all so different and our students get exposed to a variety of personality & teaching styles even before we mix things up for kids-I so would want my children in a class with a teacher LIKE YOU! I think teachers like you are awesome! Your direct high expectations ARE YOUR STUDENT’S MOTIVATING STRATEGY!!
Sometimes one of us, we be, just what a student needs.
SWF Seeking Bliss Through Information Not Ignorance
August 26th, 2010
9:01 pm
I am not in the room, but I can hear the tv, a character on some tv show (30 Rock(?))- just said “And I’m getting paid 1 million TEACHER SALARIES!”
HAHA – 2 funny. just thought I would share that
teacher salaries – an unit of quantity
hahaha
hs teacher
August 26th, 2010
10:10 pm
I recently explained to my dentist that merit pay for teachers is similar to dentists’ salaries being based on how many of their patients floss every day.
The dentist can examine your dental problems, correct what he can, and make suggestions for better dental health, but it is up to the patient to do the work.
Of course, in the case of dentists, the worse their patients care for their teeth, the more profitable it is for the dentist.
Devil's Advocate
August 26th, 2010
10:42 pm
I bet dentists could get their patients to floss if they spent an hour a day with them.
Elizabeth
August 27th, 2010
8:16 am
High schoool teacher– Define “relationship”. I did establish a relationship and rapport with most of my studetns. They came back reminiscing about my class and the way I used gentle ( not sarcastic) humor to get them to work. Sometimes we had games or oral quizzes to keep them alert. But most of the time I had a quiet classroom where students worked BY THEMSELVES and were required to figure it out for themselves. It’s called THINKING. When my kids got into groups, they knew they had better produce or they would be completing the assignment at home on their own. And it was always a culmination to a unit, not a begiining or middle. They had to work before they got into the group. Those who did not work did not get into the group. And that caused me to be even more vilified. But despite the fact that I was not their friend and made it clear that I was not their parent ( I did NOT provide paper and pencils for those who left them behind, nor did I send them to lockers to get them), most of them responded to the adult authority figure
(me) positively after they got to know me. Those who did not– a small percentage– and their parents caused all the trouble. I repeat — I am not a salesperson, an entertainer , or a surrogate parent. I AM A TEACHER.
Elizabeth
August 27th, 2010
8:23 am
If a dentist could spend an hour with ONE patient, I am certain he could get them to floss. But if a dentist was spending ONE hour with 30 patients, all of whom had different needs and problems with their teeth, how many do you think he could get to floss when he had an average of 2 minutes per patient to fill a tooth, clean teeth, examine the mouth, counsel the patients on what they need to do, etc.? That is the flaw in your argument. A dentist sees one person at a time. Teachers see 30 students ( sometimes more ) in that hour or less. If the dentiost’s patient does not follow the advice given, the dentist can refuse to service them again. Teachers cannot. You are comparing apples and oranges. You obviously have NO CLUE about what teachers really have to do.
Devil's Advocate
August 27th, 2010
10:55 am
I am a teacher. And i know that in my 70 minute block, I can easily teach all the state standards, push for critical thinking, and establish relationships that start to break down the barriers to achievement.
And you clearly are going too crazy with that stupid analogy. A dentist could easily get 35 people to floss in an hour, if they planned corectly. You yourself admit that it’s apples to oranges anyway, so why are you even trying to extend the analogy to a ridiculous extreme. Check yourself.
LLL
August 27th, 2010
12:43 pm
You know, my dentist convinced me to floss regularly by charging me so much for all the corrective work he had to do because I wasn’t flossing. I don’t think he spent an hour with me – although I wasn in there for more like 2 hours – because he was in and out taking care of a few other patients at the same time.
Pat
August 27th, 2010
6:14 pm
Thinking of the dentist analogy, thinking about, “A dentist could easily get 35 people to floss in an hour, if they planned corectly”. I don’t know.
It makes me think about how all the Minister’s (Rev. Preacher etc..) children I knew when growing up were such Hell-Raisers compared to the rest of us.
Retired Educator
August 28th, 2010
11:26 am
The biggest problem with the public vs teachers is that teachers spent countless hours in school and a amassed hugh debt to become professionals in the field of education, and the public did not; yet, everyone wants to tell educators how to do what they were trained to do without having been trained to do the same job.
That includes parents, politicians, and the media. Anyone who wants to direct the job of teaching should have at least been educated in the same field so that would know what they are talking about instead of blowing off the cuff steam on how best to educate our children.
DMACK
August 28th, 2010
1:42 pm
Public perception of education is largely based on the erroneous reporting of misinterpreted statistics and news stories. Unfortunately, as this report indicates, most of the respondents believe their local schools are doing a good job. However,when a few teachers are accused of improper relations with students and a few administrators are accused of stealing and cheating…….the public is misled again by the few bad examples…….
lovetoteach
August 28th, 2010
5:22 pm
I’m teacher who supports merit pay and eliminating tenure…there are many of us, but we keep our mouths shut lest we be stoned (joking). I’ve seen tenure protect the jobs of very ineffective educators. If I put in long hours of committed and enthusiastic work, and if that results in happy children who make great educational gains, why shouldn’t I be paid an incentive?
Special Ed. Teacher
August 29th, 2010
2:52 pm
The question that people are not thinking about is how do you base the merit pay fairly for all educators across the board? How do you account for special education classes if there is a one size fits all merit pay standard? If you are teaching a special education class under the merit pay standard you are out of luck if they base it on standardized testing results.
They need to come up with a much better method than testing. The recent testing/erasure scandal in APS should show us that testing is not all that it seems and should not be the only criteria to determine effectiveness.