Rather than driving out bad teachers, let’s keep good ones
Here’s another op-ed by UGA prof Peter Smagorinsky. Smagorinsky is professor of English education. The piece runs on the education page Monday, but here is a preview:
Imagine being in a work environment where, in order to make sure that poor performances are discouraged or punished, the rules are structured to ensure uniformity at a low, yet acceptable level. Then imagine being a smart, creative, dynamic person in such an environment. You have great ideas that might lead to new ways of doing things, but the rules are structured so that your job is to produce your widgets in the same manner as your least-inspiring colleagues. Would you stay, or would you go?
Attracting and retaining the sort of teachers envisioned by U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan — the best and the brightest, the vibrant and the forward-thinking — seems highly unlikely in the sort of environment he is creating with his Race to the Top initiative. His plan is designed to drive bad teachers from the profession by making teaching and learning uniform and making teachers accountable to his low standards.
Let’s take some renowned teachers from history. Socrates, although at times rather a bully, used a method to interrogate and expose the weak thinking processes of students. His teaching was centered on producing better thinkers who could then help advance Athenian democracy. But Socrates in the Duncan era would not be engaging his students in thought. He would be preparing them to pass tests that evaluated their ability to answer questions about which Greek fighting ship was invented first, the trireme or the penteconter, and whether or not the trireme was a single-tier ship with two tiers of oars, or a double-tier ship with one tier of oars. (Correct answer: The trireme was a single-tier ship with two tiers of oars. Bonus points if you knew that there was only one man to an oar.)
Or let’s take another ancient teacher of note, Jesus. Whether you are a Christian or not, you might consider Jesus to be a pretty good teacher, or at least acknowledge that his lecture notes have survived for a pretty long time.
Imagine him giving the Sermon on the Mount, and then having stone tablets distributed to the assembled listeners in which they were required to answer questions about his speech. Paper had been invented by then, but this being school, they were a millennium behind in resources. Question #1: Blessed are the merciful, because (a) theirs is the kingdom of heaven; (b) they shall be comforted; (c) they shall inherit the earth; (d) they shall be filled. Actually, that was a trick question: The correct answer is that the merciful shall obtain mercy. See you in hell.
Fortunately for them, neither Socrates nor Jesus taught in a U.S. school, where the emphasis is on eliminating bad teachers instead of attracting and retaining good ones. I suspect that neither would last long as the test-administering functionary required by Duncan.
We will have a few bad teachers no matter what we do. But if we obsess on them, then we’ll lose sight of the fact that good teachers require something more than an environment meant to punish bad ones. Good teachers need to feel valued and respected. They need to have the latitude to exercise good judgment, to be different when they need to, to incorporate new ideas into their teaching, to view their work as a way to grow intellectually and in the process inspire their students toward the same vigorous and invigorating way of approaching life.
The straightjackets of minimum-competency national standards and the testing mandates that enforce them may well make such work virtually impossible to imagine or carry out.
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105 comments Add your comment
David Sims
February 4th, 2011
3:00 am
But if the teacher is teaching a class on the history of ship building, why would the test ask questions about statesmanship? Or, if the teacher is teaching a civics class, why would nautical or shipwright questions appear on the midterm? Even Socrates would pose questions about trireme design and operation if he were trying to teach a subject for which such questions were relevant.
When you have only so many slots, and all of them are full, albeit not with the best people, you have to find the worst of them and cast them out. Then the vacant slots can be filled by better people. If your egg carton has a few rotten eggs in it, you first cast out the bad before attempting to insert good replacements.
The problem isn’t in the idea of winnowing. The problem is that the winnowing procedure in place might not discriminate well between the grain and the chaff. You don’t winnow wheat in a hurricane, since wind that strong will blow both grain and chaff away. But neither do you winnow in perfectly calm air, because then both the wheat and the chaff will fall straight down and nothing will be separated.
So to find the best teachers, you must first eliminate the strictures upon them which require them to pace their teaching to the intelligence of the slowest of their students. You must fail some students in order to discover which of the teachers should also flunk out.
Elizabeth
February 4th, 2011
5:16 am
Once again, this article says it all very well. That is why I am counting the days until I can leave. Requiring me to teach like everybody else and to such low standards is my greatest frustration. It is why I will leave as soon as I can.
Justme
February 4th, 2011
5:30 am
“We will have a few bad teachers no matter what we do. But if we obsess on them, then we’ll lose sight of the fact that good teachers require something more than an environment meant to punish bad ones. Good teachers need to feel valued and respected. They need to have the latitude to exercise good judgment, to be different when they need to, to incorporate new ideas into their teaching, to view their work as a way to grow intellectually and in the process inspire their students toward the same vigorous and invigorating way of approaching life”
Replace the word teachers with students, and teaching with learning.
Would we ever treat students the way teachers are being treated? What would that say of us as teachers? Let’s raise the bar to allow for creative teaching.
Melyn Roberson
February 4th, 2011
5:31 am
The dedicated and smart teachers
will check the necessary boxes and inspite of
the broken system will do a good
job with compensation or recognition.
They always have and the mediocre will
continue to get by with little effort and
shortcuts.
It is depressing to be a teacher until
you close the door and then all of the documentation
fades away, the crazy parents and even the
pay and you do what you love, TEACH. It
is the only thing I can control in my profession.
Melyn Roberson
February 4th, 2011
5:32 am
Oops WITHOUT compensation or recognition!
Teaching Family
February 4th, 2011
6:02 am
Our principal managed to remove the four genuinely bad teachers from our school between summer and the early part of the school year. Opportunities arose to shift those teachers away from the school and she took advantage of it. It’s been a wonderful year! Parents are happier and our teacher lunch room is a more positive place to be. You can feel the reins loosening on teaching uniformity because the administration now trusts that most classrooms are being run in a dynamic fashion. Its vital that principals be given the means to get rid of the poor performing teachers so that they can then feel comfortable “giving latitiude to exercise good judgment.” My school is experiencing that this year. Unfortunately, those bad teachers were sent to other various schools in the district.
NF Teacher
February 4th, 2011
6:02 am
David,
The idea is that if I teach history, I do not have enough time to implement higher-level, creative projects that require a combination of content knowledge and cognitive ability. Instead, I’m forced (which is unfortunately true- bye bye to my awesome, “Causes of the American Revolution Primary Source Project”) to employ “trivia” multiple-choice exams that mimic state questions. Because the EOCT tests content through present day, most teachers must race through the curriculum.
Additionally, as an AP teacher whose students’ scores consistently outperform most others at the school (and most likely the county level), there is NO recognition. Instead, school systems focus on “driving” out the poor teachers and regularly mandate new requirements for all teachers to implement such as Step2Achieve, data utilization, “power standards,” peer mentoring, after-school tutoring, peer observations, etc.
After four years of “do more with less time and resources,” no wonder why I’m contemplating leaving!
Bryan in South GA
February 4th, 2011
6:07 am
Thank you, Maureen, for sharing this op-ed. Is enrollment in teacher training decreasing? I’m trying to be the correct “good” teacher who gets to keep his job. According to my employer, a good teacher has students who meet and exceed expectations on CRCT. That’s the definition of good teaching where I work.
Elizabeth
February 4th, 2011
6:11 am
“Shift them away from the school” does NOT mean getting rid of them. It means transferring the problem to another school. Thye will just a problem for someone else until principals document and fire them.
Honker
February 4th, 2011
6:23 am
If you have bad teachers at a school it is because you have a bad administrator.
Teachers aren’t the problem. They are the solution.
HS Math Teacher
February 4th, 2011
6:46 am
I wish all teachers could be of the kind to earn the following respect:
“There are no bad soldiers, just bad generals.”
Field Marshall Bernard Law Montgomery
Turish
February 4th, 2011
6:57 am
We currently have a terrible teacher in our building. He has been pushed out of core classes, and is now teaching an expoloratory class where he can “do the least amount of damage.” I was told by the prinicpal that he is going to have to be at the school another year, because he needs another year of paperwork before he can fire the bad teacher. THIS IS COMPLETELY ABSURD. The fact that our students will have to suffer another year is the reason why I understand that our current evaluation system/tenure system is flawed. There must be a healthy compromise to it all. Likewise, of the 3 principals in my building, 2 of them (APs) are IDIOTS. They have NO business observing me and/or giving me any pointers. They do not know my content, and simply got their Admin. degrees from a diploma mill. That particular system is flawed too. There are MANY things wrong with education, and I suggest the DOE/GaDOE fix it ONE step at a TIME.
eLS
February 4th, 2011
7:00 am
In my teaching experience (15 yrs) the few times I’ve actually seen the emphasis placed on good teachers have had a positive effect. The teachers that aren’t up-to-par realize it, and either try to improve or find another school to be miserable in. I agree with this post.
I dont' look back
February 4th, 2011
7:18 am
I left teaching because I was not able to be the teacher I knew that I could be in DCSS. I haven’t looked back. Until teachers are able to teach and not to the test, but really teach, than intelligent people will not stay long in education. They will move on and find another job that they can use their knowledge and creativity.
Inman Park Boy
February 4th, 2011
7:37 am
Those that leave always have some good excuse.
Scrod
February 4th, 2011
7:47 am
Another issue I would like to see addressed is easing the hoops one must jump through to transition from a professional role in the workplace to becoming a teacher. The state laments the shortage of math and science teachers but makes it ridiculously unappealing for working professionals to transition to the classroom. If we’re qualified and are willing to take the 60% pay cut, how about eliminating all the red tape and recruit some new blood?
Jordan Kohanim
February 4th, 2011
7:48 am
What a breath of fresh air! I absolutely agree with this article. I do not structure my classroom to cater to the 3% that will break the rules. Setting up your system around only punitive procedures does not foster growth–not for students or teachers.
Who can explain this?
February 4th, 2011
8:03 am
There is lost sight of the real question….how in the world do you evaluate what a “good” teacher is? What qualifies a teacher as better than the lady next door? High test grades? Lack of parental complaints and or office referalls?
Dr. Craig Spinks/ Augusta
February 4th, 2011
8:13 am
Our kids need good teachers to help them acquire the knowledge, skills and attitudes they’ll need to succeed as spouses, parents, citizens and workers in a fast-changing world.
But do our kids need good teachers to help them pass tests whose “cut scores” enforce “standards” less rigorous than those demanded by that fast-changing world?
Let’s raise our academic and behavioral standards to meet future demands. Then allow our good teachers- and we have plenty of them- to use their intelligence, creativity and industry to help our students meet our higher expectations.
Raising student standards and freeing our teachers from bureaucratic ham-stringing will separate the wheat from the chaff among our teachers.
EnoughAlready
February 4th, 2011
8:20 am
Definition of a bad teacher: An 8th grade social studies teacher who request that her class makes a cookie map every 9 weeks or semester. The class never had a real project or homework. However, the teacher held a class session where the students showed her the latest dance moves.
I kid you not.
HS Public Teacher
February 4th, 2011
8:21 am
I left DeKalb County just because of this reason. At that school, teachers were told that we had to teach a pre-written script such that every teacher did the same thing on the same day. The County coordinator literally said that she wanted to walk into two random classes on the same day and hear the exact same lesson.
How absurb is that? Are all kids the same? Does everyone learn the same way or at the same pace?
And, why is a human teacher needed at all? Why not just show the kids a video tape of this scripted lesson? That would save tons of money!
Sure, DeKalb has a lion’s share of problems, but I just could not stomach that one.
HS Public Teacher
February 4th, 2011
8:25 am
@EnoughAlready – If you think that is bad, just wait. Georgia (our new Gov. Deal) is pushing for teachers to be evaluated based on a survey from the students.
So, that social studies teachers that allows dancing in her room will likely do more things like that because she wants the children to rate her highly. What child would rate her low when they can dance in her class rather than learn and do work? Next, she will be handing out candy every day and throwing parties every other day.
Yep, things are heading in the wrong direction in Georgia and it will only get worse….
williebkind
February 4th, 2011
8:28 am
I got it! Pay all teachers a million dollars and we will have all “A” students. Problem solved.
Former teacher
February 4th, 2011
8:38 am
@Who can explain this?: Agreed. There may be a difference between a popular teacher and a “good” or effective teacher. Being well liked as a teacher can make you more effective–charisma does count– but it doesn’t always mean the teacher uses it to maximize learning, though many good teachers do.
Also, lots of students and parents like teachers who never deliver bad news, i.e., “your child can’t read.” So parents think the children are doing better than they are. Parents like teachers who tell them their children are doing well. I taught in private school, and we almost never told the truth about students who were below grade level or below the curriculum level. The official line was always our students were better and brighter because they were at our school. In my view, private school is more like a club. It’s just mutual congratulation to make the tuition come in. Who knows which private schools are best? They don’t publish any test scores.
So, though I got off topic, what I mean to say is that subjectivity certainly informs our ideas about who is a good teacher as well. I’ve seen many a crowd-pleasing creative assignment that didn’t teach the students much. It’s a tough call.
sissyuga
February 4th, 2011
8:40 am
The teaching profession is too hard and as a result, bad teachers cannot survive. Take the focus off of removing “bad” teachers because they won’t last anyway.
Pluto
February 4th, 2011
8:44 am
Sounds alot like No Teacher Left Behind to me. I agree with a previous blogger; who is making the judgement on behalf of the teacher. I am pretty sure (almost) ALL teachers think they are good. How about coaches on the high school level? I coached a varsity program for 8 years and it was tough to have your A game every day in the classroom.
Malorie
February 4th, 2011
9:32 am
The bottom line is this – it doesn’t matter if you’re a good teacher or not. If the principal and his administrative team like you, you can stay at that school. The minute you disagree with him/her, you will be asked to transfer.
William Casey
February 4th, 2011
9:33 am
One of my graduate school professors back in the ’70’s taught me that excellent teaching “is as much an art as a science.” Forty years later in retirement, I truly understand what he meant. The learning process is all about the interaction of human beings and that interaction is largely a function of personality. It can never be entirely standardized on the industrial model, i.e.— raw material (young people) come in one door, are processed by technicians (teachers) who have been trained by experts in the “right” way to apply procedures and emerge as finished products (educated adults) at the other door. This works only at a very low level of learning.
This has been on my mind lately because I’ve been having an online discussions about the current situation in Egypt with several former students of mine from classes I taught 10-20 years ago. Yes, the industrial model could have taught them the basic facts about Egypt, Islam and revolutions. It could never have prepared them to do the sophisticated analysis of the situation they are capable of today. Awe inspiring (at least to me!) Of course, I can’t take all the credit for this, but I had a part in it. And you’re going to judge me as a teacher based on a silly standardized “end of course test?” Foolish people.
“The fruits of excellent teaching are gathered only after the students are gone.”
Agreed
February 4th, 2011
9:43 am
Maureen,
Thank you for this piece. I totally agree with it. As a teacher, I am frustrated with what education has become. It is more than discouraging that people who know NOTHING about how children develop and learn are trying to “improve” our teaching with this Race to the Top nonsense.
I do love teaching and I enjoy my students a lot. I feel very sorry for them because they are the innocent victims of all this craziness.
In my county we have had a real increase this year in the number of forms that we have to fill out and turn in in order to “analyze” test results that are due and I’m assuming this is due to the RTTT. It takes up a lot of my time that I could have spent planning for and teaching my students. I feel that I am a student again because of all the “assignments” that are due-all to make sure that we know how our students are performing. Here’s a hint for Mr. Duncan: the good teachers already knew.
EnoughAlready
February 4th, 2011
10:16 am
If we dropped all testing today, gave teachers absolute control of the classroom and raised starting pay to $65,000 for all; then waited to see how students performed on the SAT their senior year(2015), we would be disappointed.
As a result, my prediction would be more than 50% expulsion from school and a higher dropout rate. The end result is not acceptable.
Dr. John Trotter
February 4th, 2011
10:22 am
Let’s see now…We have more people now thinking John Trotter’s thoughts after John Trotter. Ha! How many times have I said on http://www.theteachersadvocate.com and blogs like this or even as far back as 1990 in your own AJC’s Sunday’s Op-ed section that we are driving out creative teachers? I am creative, and I wouldn’t last a day under the moronic evaluative system that we now have in place in Georgia with the spineless, myopic, and many times mean-spirited administrators bubbling in “Needs Improvement” on the evaluative forms at their every whim.
I will state again what I have stated a zillion times: A loose net will catch any bad teacher; a tight net will only suffocate the good, creative teachers. It’s the old Loose Net vs. the Tight Net approach to evaluating teachers. I commend Professor Peter Smagorinsky for putting this in writing. I actually first came across the Loose Net vs. Tight Net approach from my major professor at UGA, Dr. Carvin Brown. I was his graduate assistant while working on my first doctorate. Dr. Brown was head of the Department of Educational Administration and Field Services. The department is called something different now; I can’t keep up with all of the name changes. Back when I became a graduate assistant to the legendary Doyne Smith (before he retired) and then to Carvin Brown (as he assumed the leadership in the department), I was a young 26 years old. I must say that I was a jackanape, but for 26, I already knew a heck of a lot about how schools should operate. I was a precocious whippersnapper, I suppose. Now at 57, I can see that I was quite fortunate to have been around the professors in that department on a daily basis. Drs. Carvin Brown, Kenneth Matthews, Eugene Boyce, the late Dave Weller, Carl Schneitger (I know that I am misspelling this name — sorry, Carl), Harry Williams. These guys were on my dissertation committee. Great guys.
So, Dr. Smagorinsky, keep up the clamoring for more freedom and creativity in public education. The current approach is smothering the classroom educators and has run off many a very good and creative soul from teaching.
math teacher
February 4th, 2011
10:44 am
Why do we not get paid more?
math teacher
February 4th, 2011
10:48 am
@enough already,
I can speak for me that if I had a little perk incentive(more money), I would work harder and do my best to do terrific job. Right now I feel to complacent.
Tony
February 4th, 2011
11:17 am
Designing and implementing systems that focus on the mediocre is exactly what is being pushed down our throats. All this while waving the flag and proclaiming we need to attract and retain the best and brightest. In addition to the classroom methods and evaluations, the politicians have cut pay and resources to the point that it is ridiculous to even talk about attracting better teachers. Of course they are obfuscating this issue by talking about the mythical “performance pay” as if this will truly come to pass and become the attractive force for new teachers.
The politicians and business leaders who push for these things have no clue what it takes to run a classroom and get kids to learn. As Professor Smagorinsky so eloquently stated, we must not focus so strongly on the few bad apples.
Dr. John Trotter
February 4th, 2011
11:20 am
Pardon me, Dave. I misspoke about “the late” Dave Weller. No, Dave is alive and well. I had him for a class or two. Great guy. But, I was thinking of another professor whose name escapes me now. He was on my dissertation committee, and he died before I completed my dissertation.
GA Teach
February 4th, 2011
11:32 am
If the administration wants to let a teacher go they can and they do not have to displace the teacher. We do not have so called tenure. All tenure means in Georgia is the teacher has the right to question the school board for non-renewal of contract after a 4th year contract is signed…that does not mean they will get their job back.
just curious
February 4th, 2011
11:36 am
Being a High School teacher of both an EOCT class and a non-EOCT class i’m well aware of the differences in expectations. I’m constantly remind of the standards and elements for the EOCT class. It’s like a sprint from day one to the end with administrators, lead teachers and busybodies reminding me what i have to accomplish. On the other hand, nobody seems to care about what goes on in the non-EOCT class. We have plenty of time for in depth discussion. If we spend a little more time on one topic and gloss over another who cares. The environment of the classes are worlds apart and the non-EOCT class reminds me of why i entered this profession from the “real world” to begin with.
td
February 4th, 2011
11:46 am
My question is how can you measure a great teacher? Is it the degrees they hold? Is it the number of children that pass a standardized test? Some of the best teachers I ever had only had a bachelor’s degree and a horrible GPA but they had the ability to motivate the students to give their best effort in the classroom. How do you quantify this ability?
I once had a teacher with a Phd, top of their class GPA, many awards in his field, published articles and changed the curriculum to the most recent fad. The problem was he could not hit the right button in me or most of my peers to motivate us to give 100% effort in his class. Was this person a great teacher?
HS Public Teacher
February 4th, 2011
11:56 am
It constantly amazes me how so many people have such strong opinions on such important topics/subjects when they know next to nothing about it.
Just because your are/were a STUDENT does not qualify you to understand pedagogy! Just because you made good grades in school, does not mean that you know HOW to teach.
Yet, EVERYONE feels that they are capable of judging teachers. I find this laughable.
sissyuga
February 4th, 2011
11:58 am
Pluto-If you are not keeping up with all of the 100,000 things that teachers have to do; you stand out like a sore thumb. Team leaders talk, other teachers talk, it shows up in administrative walkthrougs-you will be outed… and won’t survive. It shows up.
HS Public Teacher
February 4th, 2011
11:58 am
@EnoughAlready @10:16 AM….
You set up hypothetical circumstances that are not plausible, and then you make a seemingly random judgment on the outcome with no basis of fact whatsoever.
Do you really think that anyone will take you seriously?
2 cents
February 4th, 2011
12:07 pm
on top of all that; what if the principal/admin and teacher just don’t like each other? others have posted before that a bad admin could really hurt a school.
William Casey
February 4th, 2011
12:16 pm
@ HS PUBLIC TEACHER: “Amen!”
EnoughAlready
February 4th, 2011
12:24 pm
HS Public Teacher
February 4th, 2011
11:58 am
Hypothetical circumstances? I have seen many of you on this blog who request a reduction of test/no testing, increase in pay and more control in the classroom. You call that a hypothical situation; heck it’s what you say would make a difference.
As for no basis in facts????? I have also read where many on this blog would like to kick “bad” apples out of the classroom and only teach those who you believe are there to learn or who have heavily involved parents. You criticize your principals for not taking these kids out of your classroom.
It’s not a random judgement of the outcome; it’s exactly what I have read as suggestion from those who say they are teachers on this blog. You want more control of your classroom, pay and less testing. You want to have control to remove disciplinary students, teach using your own methods, less county/state/federal test and a significant pay increase.
I don’t care if anyone on this blog takes me seriously; the question is who do you think will take you as a teacher seriously?
If you get what you want, I as a parent and taxpayer expect a significant improvement in graduation rates, military exam, SAT scores and better cashiers in our grocery stores.
William Casey
February 4th, 2011
12:42 pm
I’ve often wonder why those who seek to evaluate teachers never seem to ask for the opinions of those who REALLY know: former students who have been out of a teacher’s classroom for a number of years. Please indulge me as I give props to some truly excellent teachers:
Ms Yancey: Ragsdale Elementary
Ms Kowalski: Wadsworth Elementary
Mary Hiers: Southwest DeKalb HS
Charles Bowen: SWD HS
Gordon Finnie: University of West Georgia
Edwin Neal: UWG
Burdett Wantland: UWG
Hugh McTeer: UWG
Wright Vermilya: St. Pius X HS
Greg Meegan: St. Pius X HS
Patti Pair: Chattahoochee HS
factseeker
February 4th, 2011
12:46 pm
David S. I like your way of thinking on this.
If your egg carton has a few rotten eggs in it, you first throw out the bad ones before you put it back into the refrigerator.
If we examine the lives of those students who began public schooling @ the begining of the 21st century, that started in kindergarten as well as those that followed and examine their progression through the system to date, we can honestly say there is no legitimate reason for the large number of failures and/or missing the mark we are witnessing today.
Maureen Downey
February 4th, 2011
12:51 pm
@William Casey, Great list.
Maureen
HS Public Teacher
February 4th, 2011
1:17 pm
@EnoughAlready….
And you are the problem.
You ASSUME that what is happening is ‘bad’ teaching. You don’t KNOW this is the case. People like you want to point fingers at teachers without any evidence (or selective evidence). People like you totally forget that it has been PROVEN beyond doubt that the #1 influence in a child’s education is by far….. PARENTS!!!
So, you continue to bash ALL teachers and you will continue to get no where. Wake up!
Peter Smagorinsky
February 4th, 2011
1:19 pm
I second Maureen’s kudos to William Casey’s shout-out to his great teachers. Every so often an old student of mine from my Chicago-area high school teaching (1976-1990) will contact me via Facebook and it’s always the highlight of my week.
dd
February 4th, 2011
1:38 pm
So once again, the teachers who are apprehensive about the “value added testing” approach to measuring quality teaching, have no alternative other than the same “let me teach as I want to” method that has failed so miserably, across the board, in the past. Please, let’s try this out, if only as a part of the assessment of a teacher’s value. It can’t be any worse, and forces administrators to remove the awful teachers (since they would have a harder time hiding behind the actual numbers, than today’s subjective approach). This removal of those who bring down the rest of the staff would be a positive result for the good and great teachers, and all the students.