Why educators (and others) behave badly under pressure
Blog contributor and statistician Jerry Eads, a faculty member at Georgia Gwinnett College and past president of the Georgia Educational Research Association, sent me this provocative essay and series of questions about why educators cheat and whether we have created accountability systems that foster such behaviors:
Here is his piece:
This inferential statistician asks a probability question: Who among you think that two school systems in Georgia were the only ones in the nation that engaged in unauthorized test data manipulation (“cheating”) under No Child Left Behind?
I have watched the Georgia events unfold since questions arose about test results more than a decade ago. This saga has reminded me frequently of Stanley Milgram’s research in the 1960’s. See an overview here.
Milgram wondered whether Adolf Eichmann could have “just” followed orders as he testified during his trial. In Milgram’s studies, participants readily administered what they were told were potentially lethal electric shocks to others after simply being told to do so. (The “recipients” actually just acted as if they received shock.) Numerous other studies have confirmed Milgram’s findings (a review of them was published by Thomas Blass in 1999).
In his 1974 book “Obedience to Authority,” Milgram asked, “Could it be that Eichmann and his million accomplices in the Holocaust were just following orders? Could we call them all accomplices?”
Generalizing his findings beyond questions about the Holocaust, he concluded that “ordinary people, simply doing their jobs, and without any particular hostility on their part, can become agents in a terrible destructive process. Moreover, even when the destructive effects of their work become patently clear, and they are asked to carry out actions incompatible with fundamental standards of morality, relatively few people have the resources needed to resist authority.”
Of course, the Holocaust was infinitely worse than any amount of student test results manipulation, yet if the Milgram study illustrates how readily so many will shock others, and if the Holocaust illustrates how readily so many will send others to their deaths, it’s not at all difficult to imagine that some educators might manipulate test scores if pressured by higher authorities.
That’s not to say manipulating test scores (or shocking participants in an experiment) is excusable; it’s simply to suggest that current national accountability policy creates an environment in which we should not be surprised that some people behaved badly. Perhaps we should be surprised, pleased, and perhaps even awed that the vast majority remained steadfast to their core educational beliefs and focused on doing what they knew was best for their students.
Given we’re so incessantly disposed to finger pointing, who in relation to No Child would you choose as the equivalent to Hitler and Eichmann?
Far more importantly, how might you suggest the-beatings-will-continue-until-morale-improves-prone policymakers rethink education policy so that we might begin making public education better rather than continuing to tear it apart?
Will “Race to the Top” correct the mistakes of NCLB or is it just working around the edges of the same underlying approach?
I find this lesson from Milgram’s later work of interest: When a peer, told privately to refuse to administer high shock, was “planted” in the room, almost all of the participants also refused to administer high shock.
Unfortunately, teachers who objected to cheating or refused to cheat were frequently threatened, punished or fired, and others learned that lesson. Perhaps, if teachers were treated as respected professionals rather than as serfs (and scapegoats), they might have been heard when they spoke and we never would have had the sad tragedy of Georgia’s cheating scandals. But then if teachers were treated as respected professionals, perhaps we would never have had the inexcusable travesty of NCLB in the first place.
–From Maureen Downey, for the AJC Get Schooled blog
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193 comments Add your comment
Jordan Kohanim
December 27th, 2011
8:44 pm
I apologize in advance for the series of long posts and any ‘tone’ issues.
1.Why do you assume that the success of a student is based upon a test score? 2. We can see example after example of students whose educational failings are evident in the real world. 3. I stood behind two teenagers in a store recently who couldn’t figure out what 50% off of $14.99 was without dragging out the calculator on their cell phones. 4. It’s glaringly obvious that these 2 were lacking in basic math skills that would have been evident to a teacher who was paying attention long before their standardized test scores came back.
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There is a lot to address here, so I hope you don’t mind if I number your contentions. I apologize in advance for altering your post for the sake of discussion, but I think it will help our discourse.
1. NCLB has put emphasis on test scores as opposed to portfolio-based systems. High stakes testing is just that—high stakes. Schools lose funding for poor test performance. I don’t make the assumption, the money flow speaks for itself.
2. Please provide examples for the “example after example” argument you cite.
3. This is an anecdotal piece of data. Besides, the high stakes test allows them to use a calculator.
4. Perhaps, but how do you know they graduated high school? Did you ask them? Why do you automatically assume they did. Even if they did graduate high school, how do you know it wasn’t convenience or laziness that kept them from doing simple math as opposed to lack of skill. I know how to use a microfiche machine, but I will use a database more readily because it is faster.
Teacher, Too
December 27th, 2011
8:45 pm
I would love to be able to retain students. It’s almost impossible to do. I’ve taught students who have failed three or four classes, but because they passed the CRCT, they were “placed” (by admin) in the next grade. These students were lacking basic skill sets. But, it’s too expensive to retain students, so basically, unless the student fails all classes and the CRCT, he/she will move along. Although there seems to be little trust for teachers, I would not think any teacher would recommend that students who fail three or even two of the core academic subjects for the entire year be “placed” or “promoted” to the next grade level.
I take my professional responsibilities quite seriously. I’m a veteran teacher, 20+ years in the classroom. I have stated my homework policy and late work policy. It is blatantly ignored by students and parents who continually write notes to “excuse” the late work. If I try to enforce the policy, there is a good chance that admin will not back me on the policy, although it is clearly stated in my syllabus.
What’s most ridiculous is that now the state wants teachers to teach the “soft” life skills, like turning assignments in on time. Then, we’re told by admin not to give zeros or to take work five or six weeks late– oh, and by the way, you can’t take points off because you’re grading the GPS (or soon, the Common Core Standard). You have to determine if the student mastered the standard, and taking points off the grade does not have anything to do with whether the student has mastered the standard.
You see– even when we try to do the right thing and teach students consequences for their actions, we’re told by our admins not to hold the student accountable. When/where will students learn the importance of turning in work on time– and, working hard to earn a good grade (rather than it be handed to them)?
irisheyes
December 27th, 2011
8:48 pm
@mahopinion, the problem is that the tests are often neither reliable or valid. For example, a couple of years ago I had a student in second grade who struggled mightily in reading. By the end of the year, she had made only miniscule progress. We had worked throughout the year to get her tested for special ed, but she kept failing the hearing screening. Federal law will not allow you to test for a learning disability if there is an underlying hearing or vision problem, so we continued to push the parents to get her hearing checked. They kept putting it off, probably because they couldn’t/wouldn’t pay for it. I tried to give her as much extra help as I could, both in the classroom and through our support teachers, but she just didn’t make the progress I had hoped for. We had her on a path towards retention because she wasn’t ready to move to third grade. The parents didn’t agree, but, in my professional opinion, she hadn’t mastered the second grade curriculum, despite all of the extra support. The CRCT rolls around (this was when we were still giving it in 2nd grade), and she passed the reading portion of the exam. How, you ask? Well, the questions are read to the students, and all she had to do was look for matching words in the story. Plus, the questions were so basic, that I knew the answer to all of them without having read any of the passages. So, guess what? That’s right, my administrators said that because she passed the CRCT, she was ready to go to third grade. Just imagine her in third grade, unable to read or write at anything approaching a FIRST grade level. She had no chance of passing the third grade CRCT, since none of it is read aloud, and now she counts towards the school AYP. She didn’t pass the third grade CRCT that April, but somehow she did after summer school. Same thing in fourth grade. So, she could be one of those fifth graders who can’t read. She’s barely reading at a third grade level now in fifth grade. Yes, the school failed her, but every single one of her teachers have tried to get her the help she needed, and we were thwarted every time by the administration and her parents. (She still fails the hearing assessment, even though the school has given the parents all of the contacts they need to get her checked for almost no charge.)
So, the standardized test here pushed her on, when a portfolio of her work would have provided more than enough evidence to retain her.
Observation
December 27th, 2011
8:52 pm
@ mahopinion, on “Cyberbaiting teachers,” Dec. 24, 12:51 pm: “Perhaps it’s time that you poor over worked, under paid souls [teachers] quit. But wait, what would you do then? You certainly aren’t qualified to work in the real world. The real world expects performance, professional behavior and cooperation in solutions.”
Why are you surprised that bloggers here consider you a troll? You’re primarily making sweeping accusations about an entire profession that you clearly don’t know anything about. There are no teachers’ unions in Georgia, although you attack teachers for being members. You don’t seem to know that social promotion is part of state law. You state (on the “Cyberbaiting” blog) that teachers have “dumbed down America” because they “teach to the lowest denominator,” although public school teachers legally must teach mentally disabled students along with regular students and non-native speakers without English language skills along with native speakers, all in the same classroom.
You yourself are “dismissive and demeaning” of teachers. Your comments are very like the ones about nurses in earlier days that termed them too lazy and ignorant to do anything but empty bedpans.
However, I don’t think you’re “Good Mother,” to analyze your stylistics. Your posts are grammatical. You don’t write a string of one-sentence paragraphs, but rather long well-developed (if erroneous) ones. You fail to include any personal sob-stories about the troubles you’ve seen. You also lack the peculiar meanness and cruelty of GM.
But if you’ve acquired a doctorate in Nursing, then you must know the importance of empirical data to support statements you make. And you have made many about K-12 education without such evidence.
William Casey
December 27th, 2011
8:55 pm
@mahopinion: During my 31 years in schools, I was a great believer in rigorous testing created by ME, the guy who taught the class. Much tougher than the standardized tests I’ve seen. However, my evaluation of student progress went much deeper than that. Most of us who are critical of standardized testing are not attempting to evade accountability. We simply recognize that learning is a little more complicated than what can possibly be measured on such a test.
Jordan Kohanim
December 27th, 2011
8:57 pm
Mah, you said:
1.Have their been any studies that show a correlation between test scores and future academic/life success? At this point, I seriously doubt it. 2.Do you honestly believe that the creators of these tests did it just to make your job as a teacher that much harder? 3. Do you truly believe that reading all that paperwork you are complaining about is an administrator’s idea of fun? 4. The point of all these tests and records is to get a real apples to apples comparison so that fundamental trends can be identified. 5.Complaining about having to do it, or worse, cheating to “improve” the results serves to make sure that no real, positive changes ever occur.
_________________________________________________________________________________
1. As far as I know—no. I don’t know how such a study could be conducted, and to be honest, I think we’re arguing the same thing. I disagree with the use of standardized testing to categorize a student/school/teacher’s success or knowledge base. In fact, I think it creates the type of narrowing scope of curriculum that will keep the US from competing in a global marketplace.
2. No. I think the test arose from a misplaced faith in a poorly researched (and now denounced) piece of propaganda known as A Nation at Risk.
3. I complained about paperwork? When? I think there are flawed parts of the process, yes. I also think they were created because someone thought it would help. I see no maliciousness in any education reform—I just see a lot of misplaced effort.
4. Before you can claim “these tests,” you have to tell me which one. I disagree that the CRCT accurately reflects our curriculum. As for the EOCTs, they are trying to catch up with the multiple curriculum reform movements (QCC, GPS, CCPS).
5. Complaining doesn’t help. Agreed. However, debating and discussing the inadequacies of the process is necessary to expose them. Cheating is never okay. Ever.
Jordan Kohanim
December 27th, 2011
9:11 pm
Mah said:
1. I always laugh when a teacher says “why is there so much emphasis on test scores”.
2a. Aren’t the very students you are teaching evaluated on their test scores?
2b.Would you give a passing grade to a student who had failed every test, yet they had shown up for class every day?
3. Why should teachers and schools be exempt?
4. No, the standardized testing as we know it is not the panacea to fix all of the ills in education. But it’s not the bogey man out to get everyone either.
……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………
1. Careful. Someone might accuse you of having a dismissive tone. (I kid, I kid).
2a. Yes and no. They are evaluated partly on test scores, partly on essays, homework, class participation, discussion, etc.
2b. I don’t think, according to my grade scale, that would be possible. However, as the EOCT takes up more and more of my grading scale (it is now up to 20%), it may soon possible for them to fail every essay, and still pass the course by excelling on the EOCT.
3. They shouldn’t be exempt from the testing. That being said, it shouldn’t be emphasized to the point that schools narrow what they teach to drill and kill. Sacrificing the ingenuity of students to the Gods of Data, is an unjust use of public monies an trust.
4. Testing can be useful and good, just like modern technology. We just need to remember in the wrong hands modern technology (and incomplete data profiles) can be dangerous.
William Casey
December 27th, 2011
9:16 pm
@mahopinion regarding: “I’m wondering what your students, their parents and your administrators would think of your comments here. My guess is that they would be embarrassed for you.”
Well, her students, their parents, administrators, et al, can come to this blog and read her opinions since she posts under her real name. It annoys me no end that “outside pontificators” on schooling seem to find it necessary to hide behind semi-clever pseudonyms.
Jordan Kohanim
December 27th, 2011
9:17 pm
*and (sorry for the typo)
Columbia Grad
December 27th, 2011
9:32 pm
@d and @College Student: I’m currently in the GSU program referred to earlier.
I agree with d, in that if you don’t have the middle school math (or science) content down by college without a very brief refresher (if that), then you might want to re-evaluate whether you should be teaching the subject. This is not a judgement of your content knowledge, College Student, as I don’t know if you are uncomfortable with the content or are in need of refresher. Just saying.
Quite frankly, I enjoyed the graduate level math and science courses (not the “Grad Math for Teachers”, but actual Grad Math and Bio). While I will likely never teach this content directly to my students, it does help for enrichment purposes. Beyond that, it helps me connect on a deeper level to the basic content I teach, which contributed greatly when it came to planning. Can I say the same for others? I don’t know.
From the list of classes you provided, that’s all par of the course in middle school math, because somewhere at some point in time, it’s all taught. Your job as a middle school math teacher is not only to teach them the “on-level” curriculum, but to prepare them for what’s coming next. If you teach 8th grade (or possibly certain seventh graders), what’s next is high school math.
To support you a bit College Student, I’m not completely happy with my program. I’m rather shocked that they let some people into a grad program for future math/science teachers without the content knowledge. It scares me a bit that some of them will be teaching within the next year. Most of the professors I’ve had the pleasure of working with are experienced and highly knowledgeable about teaching and learning. Others were barely in classroom before jumping ship for a Ph.D and a professorship. Many of these professors are given the pedagogy classes! I question is that the best they can do, especially in light of the common in-service teacher complaint that many problems in our public system is inexperienced leaders trying to fix what not necessarily broken. All in all though, I believe that several people could all graduate from the same COE at the same time, and the quality of teacher produced will still vary. Some will rise and excel, some will tread water and be just enough, a few will outright be awful. Decide which one you want to be and work towards it, College Student
Cranky_Yankee
December 27th, 2011
9:37 pm
@mah…
Standardized tests have a murky & troubled history.
Initially, Sir Francis Galton created a test in the 1880’s which he would administer for a fee that would determine intelligence based on sensory abilities.
A student of his brought the test to the US & administered it to Columbia & UPenn students, tracked their school rankings and found it didn’t predict with any kind of accuracy.
Then, in the early 1900’s the Parisians wanted to identify students who were “retarded” so that they could be sent to “special” schools without running the risk of “dumping” disruptive but “normal” kids into those same schools (sound familiar?).
Enter Alfred Binet who tried to correlate intelligence to skull size. When that didn’t pan out he & Simon tried a battery of questions & at what age the kids were able to complete given tasks from which the term “mental age” comes from.
Over his career, Binet developed the belief that intelligence was NOT predetermined but was affected by many external forces & his test was only a rough estimate of someone’s capabilities.
Enter Lewis Terman of Stanford U who modified the Binet-Simon test into the Stanford-Binet test. His purpose was to ID “slow learners” so as to remove them from schools because they could not learn.
Enter Carl Brigham of Princeton, he believed the data collected from testing WWI enlistees pointed out immigrants, blacks, etc. were less intelligent than natural born citizens. The holes in his logic are big enough to drive a locomotive through. After awhile, he recanted his “findings.” However he did believe the tests could be used as a predictor of college performance, enter the SAT.
Brigham firmly believed the SAT should not be administered through an agency (ETS) since it could be misused and misinterpreted by misinformed officials (sound familiar?).
But, the guy died & all he feared has come to pass. We now use SAT scores to “rank” state education systems, never mind you are comparing apples and bananas. Lets compare GA who pays for any student to take the test (a result of the state’s dark segregationist past) whether they plan to go to college or not and North Dakota where most students take the ACT except for those who hope to go out of state to say Harvard, Yale, Princeton. Gee, I wonder why ND is ranked so much higher in comparison?
You are correct, standardized testing is not the bogey man, the people who misuse the data generated by it & have shaped national education policy based on it ARE.
d
December 27th, 2011
10:07 pm
She who shall not be named made a comment about teenagers not being able to figure out 50% of $14.99 without pulling out a calculator, and although I agree this is a problem, I wonder if this might not be as large of a problem as she makes it out to be. As Jordan correctly mentioned, students are allowed to use calculators on Georgia’s standardized tests – even the Economics EOCT which isn’t supposed to have calculations (according to the state DOE, of course, I’ve never actually seen one of these tests). Students are even allowed to use them during the SAT and ACT. The ACT asks students at every administration about their use of calculators. Perhaps the ability to use the technology is a skill that we value more than the strict memorization of facts. Think of it this way, cursive writing is not going to be taught to young people in Georgia any more. Why not? Well, in the 21st century, we as a society have come to accept electronic communication as valid. I can sign a legally binding contract online now. Perhaps knowing the answer right off the top of my head may not be as important in every instance as to knowing where or how to get the information. The process of calculating 50% off of $14.99 may be a skill that we as a global culture will find more important in the 21st century rather than saying it is $7.50 (well just in case certain individuals want me to be more specific, $7.495).
ScienceTeacher671
December 27th, 2011
10:24 pm
@Columbia Grad, @d, and @College Student – actually, as a high school and college graduate, I’d be rather embarrassed to think that there might be a middle school or high school subject that I would not be able to teach.
I might need a bit more refreshing on some than others, but shouldn’t a college graduate know pretty much everything that would be taught in middle school?
madteacher
December 27th, 2011
10:24 pm
@Mahopinion You don’t have a clue to what you are talking about…… You try to make students do their work when you don’t have the backing of parents to help you out and see how far you get. All these people out in the “Real World” think they know what they are talking about it until they come into my shoes. On top of that, these so called tests which we are so heavly judged on don’t give a true judge if that child is on grade level or not. I know special ed kids that passed that shouldn’t have and kids that could have passed that just christmas tree “which means just making patterns on the answer sheet” it because they don’t care. Of course I do not support what happened in Atlanta and now possibly in Albany in cheating. That is and should never be excused. I’m not saying that teachers should not do their jobs and be held accountable, but it should be done in a better way. The whole child should be looked at and not just the test. We have kids that have so many problems and major ones at that that teachers just can’t handle that affects how these children behave and succeed in school. I love the art of teaching, but I don’t love is somebody telling me that it is raining while your pissing down your back.
Truth in Moderation
December 27th, 2011
10:33 pm
Unrepentant sinners will not stand against evil because they do not fear God. Instead, they fear man and the Devil and will obey him, thinking that by doing so, they will preserve their own lives. As far as the cheating, what do you expect from a public school which has thrown God and His morals out?
“And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. But rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.” Matthew 10:28
Truth in Moderation
December 27th, 2011
10:53 pm
Fraud is everywhere, even in your bottle of Italian olive oil….
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/retailandconsumer/8978053/Four-out-of-five-bottles-of-Italian-olive-oil-debased.html
d
December 27th, 2011
10:55 pm
Where has God been thrown out of school? I still say the pledge of allegiance daily, use US currency which has a reference to God to buy lunch, see the Georgia flag with its reference to God, have the mandatory moment of silence, seen students have prayer, watch my coworkers bow their head before they eat a meal at school. Just because the principal cannot lead the entire school in a common prayer doesn’t mean God isn’t in our schools. True believers know better anyway.
Jerry Eads
December 27th, 2011
11:08 pm
Thanks to all for a most interesting discussion. I apologize to those who misread my intent in bringing forth the Holocaust. It WAS the reason Milgram did his work, to understand why it is that otherwise ordinary people could do such horrible things. The Holocaust, causing the deaths of millions of innocent people is certainly infinitely worse than anything else the world has ever seen. At the same time, the underlying characteristics of that horror, Milgram’s work involving (thankfully faked) electric shock, and the pressures on educators under NCLB seem quite parallel. I especially apologize to Mahopinion for his/her misreading of my statement concerning the hundeds of thousands of teachers who did NOT succumb to such pressures. Given they are ALSO of the species homo sapiens, they are no different from the “accomplices” or Milgram’s subjects, yet the vast majority did not bend to the pressures to cheat. Many – the teachers of stronger performers – had few pressures to do so, but the pressures on those teaching disadvantaged kids is enormous, and they too held fast. It would seem that teachers are, in fact, generally a far cut above the rest of us.
Several of you have asked those whose emotions got the better of them to be respectful here; I too have had my moments and would have earned such caution. That said, that respect for others is one of the most important characteristics we work very hard to ensure in our teachers, and one they in turn work hard to instill in their students. I’d ask that we do at least as well here.
The best of this holiday to all of you.
Truth in Moderation
December 27th, 2011
11:33 pm
Here’s the public high school Maher graduated from:
Pascack Hills High School http://www.nndb.com/edu/285/000163793/
Truth in Moderation
December 27th, 2011
11:50 pm
Oh yeah, Bill Maher is also a proud IVY LEAGUE graduate of Cornell University.
Wow, I can’t wait to enroll my kids so they can learn to be tolerant and articulate public communicators!
Truth in Moderation
December 28th, 2011
12:48 am
@Jerry Eads
“The Holocaust, causing the deaths of millions of innocent people is certainly infinitely worse than anything else the world has ever seen.”
As a college faculty member, your knowledge of history is shockingly limited. According to Alexander Solzhenitsyn, a prison survivor of the Soviet Gulag torture/prison system under Stalin, more then 66.5 million Orthodox Christians perished from 1917 and onward during the times of the Soviet Union. His memoirs of this horrific time is documented in GULAG ARCHIPELAGO. Please read it. Also, according to the BLACK BOOK OF COMMUNISM, 65 million Chinese (including Christians) were tortured/murdered under Mao Zedong’s “Great Leap Forward” and “Cultural Revolution”. Violence and persecution isn’t just an “anti-semitic” thing.
seen it all
December 28th, 2011
1:19 am
I’ll keep it short- Why do educators “behave badly under pressure?” Because if they don’t do as they are told, they will lose their jobs and possibly their careers. If you are given a bad evaluation, if you are non renewed, your career is over. If you do not get a good reference from your previous principal, you cannot get another job. It’s just that simple. This is Georgia, baby. It’s the good ole boy system. There is no union and you have no rights.
Truth in Moderation
December 28th, 2011
1:24 am
Your tax dollars at work:
The country we send $billions in aid to has 10% (and growing) of its population that practices GENDER SEGREGATION and makes WOMEN SIT IN THE BACK OF THE BUS! SPITTING on “immodestly” dressed women/girls is also ACCEPTABLE!
You can’t make this stuff up….
“The violence came after a wave of incidents elsewhere in Israel in which women have been compelled to sit at the back of segregated buses serving ultra-Orthodox areas or get off, despite court rulings that women may sit where they please.”
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=CNG.e4f1b364fd07e8476d59485790bab2ff.711&show_article=1
Ron Paul is right! Let’s keep our dollars in our own country and mind our OWN business.
Truth in Moderation
December 28th, 2011
3:13 am
“I Get Out”
Lauryn Hill has seen the light….What is your excuse?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UiF_G13VM5o&feature=related
Support Education
December 28th, 2011
5:35 am
Support education and also support our ally Israel.
milles
December 28th, 2011
8:08 am
Oh, sparta bubba you do so miss the point! Spelling mistakes do not make one unable to teach.
That’s the problem in a nutshell: focus on a small point and be a small person.
Double Zero Eight
December 28th, 2011
8:23 am
@ seen it all
Your assessment is 100% correct.
Lori Ballington
December 28th, 2011
8:51 am
I have just lived out the Milgram experiment. As of January 13th I will be a former special Ed teacher due to a forced resignation. I refused to manipulate data on the Georgia Alternate Assessment which is the standardized test for students who can’t take the CRCT. This was my first year to put together this nightmare of a portfolio. The GAA, as it is referred to, is an ethical nightmare. It creates a situation where teachers “cheat” and not get caught. From the start I decided I would not manipulate or “frame” the results in anyway. The pressure was immense. I was told the portfolios have to pass. It’s important to your job for them not to pass. My school is a Title 1 school and because of the formula set up by NCLB to make AYP I was informed that my GAA portfolios would make or break the school achieving AYP. Even when I questioned the ethical nature of what I was doing I was informed it was part of my job and that I just had to do it. In November I was asked to change a date and grade on a student activity. It was then all heck broke out. I went up my chain of command to register my concern. I was told by my vp that he didn’t want me to do anything unethical but they would pass they had to, the GAA is a “gimmie”. Then he brought up a certification concern which led to fairly quickly the principal getting involved. After that I was threatened and humiliated under the guise that I wasn’t qualified. My students where removed from my room. There was also a meeting with all of the other special Ed teachers where I was humiliated. Then I was given a chance to resign by my principal. She had the papers on her desk. I refused until I had a chance to consult with a lawyer. After consultation I decided it best for the students and other teachers to resign. I did not do anything wrong. My only mistake was believing if I did the right thing I would be rewarded. The pressure if I stayed was only going to intensify and create more issues for my students and fellow teachers.
Beverly Fraud
December 28th, 2011
9:06 am
Lori please tell me you consulted with a lawyer who had YOUR best interests in mind, and had NO conflicts of interests.
Beverly Fraud
December 28th, 2011
9:09 am
Why aren’t teachers DEMANDING that GAE and PAGE, instead of all the other stuff they push legislatively push for REAL protection against the type of ADMINISTRATIVE RETALIATION that could slow this down?
Is it that PAGE and GAE can’t do this, because they also represent THOSE WHO RETALIATE?
mountain man
December 28th, 2011
9:10 am
Lori Ballington – I believe you owe it to yourself and every other teacher out there to bring a massive lawsuit against everyone who pressured you at school. Your one mistake was to resign; now they can say it was your decision. You should have made them fire you, then sue everyone in the school.
mountain man
December 28th, 2011
9:25 am
And the Georgia Legislature needs to step up and fight this by establishing a strong “whistleblower” law where teachers who are pressured to cheat can report their administrators. If they are terminated for whistleblowing, then they should be entitled to their job back, and full back pay plus any legal expenses.
HS Math Teacher
December 28th, 2011
9:33 am
In the last decade, we have just nibbled at the margins of the real problem in education, reward for no merit.
In most cases, we’re just being told by policymakers to ram a large square peg through a small hole.
“Here’s our new policy, now…you go make it work.” “Oh, and by the way, there will be workshops on how to swing the hammer more effectively.”
Workshop Coordinator: Sally O’Malley, Ph.D, ABC, DEF, ETC.
mountain man
December 28th, 2011
9:35 am
29 miners died because no one would step up and defy the system. How many good teachers will be fired because they refuse to cheat before we address the problem with the system?
To Mountain Man Good Mother
December 28th, 2011
9:53 am
MM you say “How many good teachers will be fired because they refuse to cheat before we address the problem with the system?”
I am aware of zero good teachers who were fired because they refused to cheat. I am aware of HUNDREDS of teachers who are losing their jobs BECAUSE THEY CHEATED.
You have your facts backwards, Mountain Man.
Cheating will get you fired. Cheating will get you jail time.
D
December 28th, 2011
10:57 am
My wife is a hairdresser at an upscale salon so last night she forced me to watch Tabitha’s takeover. The premise is simple really. She comes in and overhauls failing salons by training the owners and staff. The overarching theme in all of the takeovers is that there was no discipline whatsoever. Tabitha would implement rules for the staff and administration to follow and sure enough the organization would turn itself around. I couldn’t help but compare it to the state of education today. The kids aren’t held accountable for anything, not discipline or academics. They get away with just about anything and they’re never given a failing grade because it will hurt their self esteem. The students learn that regardless of their lack of effort they’ll be rewarded with passing marks and be moved on to the next grade as a result. Administration isn’t held to any kind of real accountability and if they are, they push it down on the teachers. So, what we we need in education is a Tabitha style takeover. If a kid is failing, fail them. If they haven’t shown that they’re ready to move on for whatever reason, hold them back. If a teacher is incompetent, either re-train them or get rid of them. If an administrator is inefficient or too authoritative, re-train them or get rid of them. It seems so simple on the show, why can’t the education community see the reality?
Observation
December 28th, 2011
11:24 am
@ Good Mother, 9:53 am. Please read the post by Lori Ballington on Dec. 28, 8:51 am!!
Prof
December 28th, 2011
11:57 am
@ Lori Ballington, Dec. 28, 8:51 am.
I’m no lawyer, but I do wish that you would consult with another one who is objective, as Beverly Fraud implies above, to see if your case is covered under the Georgia Whistleblowers Act, OCGA 45-1-4. This Act prohibits retaliation for whistleblowing that “pertain[s] to the existence of any activity constituting fraud, waste, and abuse relating to any state programs or operations.”
I suppose what would need to be determined legally is whether “state programs or operations” covers K-12 public education in Georgia. Attorneys specializing in labor laws would be the ones to seek out here.
But, as mountain man states, “you owe it to yourself and every other teacher out there to bring a massive lawsuit against everyone who pressured you at school.” Perhaps other educators in your situation could join you, connected somehow via this blog.
mountain man
December 28th, 2011
1:03 pm
“Cheating will get you fired. Cheating will get you jail time”
And the people who encouraged you or forced you to cheat get bonuses. Where is Beverly Hall now? Last time I heard she was vacationing in Hawaii with all her bonus money that she got for having “outstanding success”. Her success was to tell her underlings that they would improve test scores – or else they would be replaced. She did not specify how to accomplish this. Then she acts surprised that they cheated or forced the teachers under them to cheat. All we hear about is the teachers getting fired. What about all the principals of those schools – are they fired? No they are put on “paid administrative leave” for their punishment. I hope every teacher that is encouaged to cheat, give better grades, pass along kids to the next grade without being on ;eve;, o told to change their attendance records QUITS. Suddenly there would be NO teachers in the inner-city schools. You CANNOT make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear. The problems with these schools lies with the STUDENTS mostly, not the teachers. Why don’t you fire the students. Oh, that’s right, Georgia law says thaty have to stay in school until they are sixteen. NCLB says they have to learn. Well these kids DON’T WANT TO LEARN. You cannot make them. Their parents don’t care. So why are we worrying about them. Let them drrop out, and then when they become criminals, lock them up and throw away the key. Or better yet, make it easier (and more desireable) to not have these kids in the first place. Stop giving welfare (TANF,SNAP, EITC) based on the number of kids you have. Birth control would solve a lot of the problem.
Lori Ballington
December 28th, 2011
1:12 pm
It is interesting to see the comments to my situation. I don’t feel it was a mistake to resign. My family was paying to high a price for situation I was under. As for a lawyer with my best interest, he counseled me to stay. My hope is that someone will hear my voice and give validation to what I’ve been through and what my students will continue to go through. Bringing a lawsuit will bring me money. I want my voice to be heard crystal clear without people thinking I’m in it to profit. Justice is not always about seeking monetary payback.
mountain man
December 28th, 2011
1:36 pm
“Have their been any studies that show a correlation between test scores and future academic/life success”
The company I work for requires either a high school diploma or a GED (GED’s require testing, I think). We want to hire people who can read and write and do basic math. It used to be that managers could move up from the hourly workers with only a high school education, but now we require a college degree. Why? So we can be sure they can read and write (since a high school diploma is not a guarantee). The students who don’t wnat to learn can drop out and be garbagemen. Or if they are female, they have babies and collect welfare.
Lori Ballington – I am sorry that your family paid a high price for the pressure you were exposed to. You could always donate any suit winnings to your favorite charity. The problem is until lawsuits are filed, the administrators will continue their behavior.
GOOD MOTHER – ARE YOU LISTENING? Teachers are leaving, either because they are too tired to fight the corruption, or they are threatened with firing. Yes, it is wrong to cheat, just as it is wrong to drive 65 in downtown Atlanta (and against the law).
Prof
December 28th, 2011
2:19 pm
@ Lori Ballington. In addition to what “mountain man” writes at 1:36 pm, you might consider that filing a lawsuit over this would also help special Ed. teachers coming after you. There have been many past poignant blog entries by such teachers who try to get assistance for their disabled students, but cannot because of the administrative pressures to promote them anyway.
Though of course it’s always easier for the person who isn’t filing the lawsuit to say this. As I’m sure you know, nothing raises academic hackles like the word “lawsuit.”
To College Student from Good Mother
December 28th, 2011
3:20 pm
College Student you say that you need to take the following classes in math, your major, but they have nothing to do with the ed department…
@d– Required math content area classes where I attend.
Math 1190 Calculus I
Math 3332 Probability and Statistical Inference
Math 3390 Mathematical Systems
Math 3395 Geometry
Math 3495 Adv Perspectives
These are strictly Math classes taught out of the Math Department, they have nothing to do with the Ed Dept.
….They are your major, College Student. You need to know more than the students you plan to teach. Even when you plan to teach middle school math, the truth is, you may be moved around to save your job. Our kids’ math teacher was bumped up from elementary school to junior high — with a week’s notice — to save her job.
So good for you for learning more than you think you need to know. When your concern is knowing HOW to teach math, just ASK a teacher. Soak up the time you spend doing your student teaching, ASK your professor or seek guidance at the college you attend instead of throwing up your hands in frustration. Please remember, you are setting an example for the children you are to teach. Learn to dig and find out and research for yourself…instead of whining and expecting everyone to spoon feed you information.
Do some research.
Learn on your own.
Ask professionals around you.
Learning is a lifelong endeavor, not a four year experience.
To Mountain Man from Good Mother
December 28th, 2011
3:47 pm
Mountain Man, You’ve blamed the students for failure to learn. You’re blaming the victims.
You’ve gone off the deep end and lack any credibility. It’s obvious you have an agenda. You’re either a cheating teacher or you’re married to one.
Methinks (meKnows) you protest too much…
To Mountain Man from Good Mother
December 28th, 2011
4:05 pm
MM, your comment regarding inner city kids is deplorable. You said about them “Suddenly there would be NO teachers in the inner-city schools. You CANNOT make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear. ”
A sow’s ear? You think an inner city child is like the ear of a pig, an animal regarded in our society as being the lowest of the low?
Your comment says it all. You have no business being in or near the business of educating children.
Dr. Monica Henson
December 28th, 2011
4:34 pm
Jerry’s piece is provocative and intriguing. With respect to his closing statement, “but then if teachers were treated as respected professionals, perhaps we would never have had the inexcusable travesty of NCLB in the first place,” I have to point out that for decades in this country, teachers were the ONLY arbiter of whether students had met standards necessary for promotion from grade to grade and ultimately, graduation from high school.
What eventually developed was a patchwork quilt across the United States where it was nearly impossible to distinguish the truly outstanding ‘A” from the barely acceptable “C-,” except in cases of Advanced Placement courses, in which success is measured, ironically, by an objective standardized test, which serves as a check and balance on the classroom teacher’s grading. Teachers who award As to students who cannot score 4s and 5s on the AP exams don’t last for long as AP teachers.
Students in this country have for decades been promoted from grade to grade without the requisite skills. While some of this is undeniably due to administrative policies, there is a great deal of responsibility to be placed at the feet of teachers for doing things like passing a student based on effort and behavior even if the child cannot actually do the assignments at a passing level, or falling back on the “D” to move a kid along so as not to have to deal with the student again next year. After nearly 100 years of teachers holding the primary authority of determining performance levels, we ended up with a 30%+ dropout rate in American high schools.
THAT is the reason why we ended up with NCLB, Jerry. And it’s also the primary reason why teachers in this country have lost so much respect among those in the professions such as law and medicine, as well as other private enterprise. NCLB was an attempt at quality control, because allowing teachers and administrators to be the sole arbiters of student achievement was clearly not working for a substantial proportion of the children in the public education system.
This point also goes to Jordan’s questions: “instead of basing a student’s/school’s/teacher’s success on a test score, why not base it on a portfolio of accomplishment? Why is there so much emphasis on test scores in the first place?” I hope that my preceding paragraphs provide a measure of response, Jordan, to your latter question.
In reply to your first question, it is far more expensive to provide objective, trained human scorers for portfolio assessment than it is to use predominantly machine-scored testing (with some human scoring for open-response and long writing assignments, as in Massachusetts). That’s the reason why states do not use portfolio assessment on a large scale for general education students.
Ole Guy
December 28th, 2011
5:41 pm
Boot, if anyone in education truly believed in the :”children first” maxim, we probably would not be sharing comments on the myriad issues which we see throughout this fine blog section simply because the issues would be, simply, nonissues. Have you ever seen a simply injury…a cut, a bruise, etc…fester into a more-serious condition simply because the initial issue…the paper cut, etc…was ignored? This is precisely where education lies; careers and (of course) money come first, with kids assuming back-burner status. Will any of this ever change? Will the “Lone Ranger” of educational reform ever appear on the horizon and swoop in to make all well…and silently ride off into the sunset of good futures for young generations? A better question might be: “what happened to an educational system which, shortly after Sputnick, October 57, was oriented toward preparing generations to become competitive, in the global arena, in the sciences of both war and piece, and on the international stage of human endeavor?”. Somewhere along the line, our (what passes for) “leaders” forgot that freedom and prosperity are ideals which must be constantly renewed, earned, and appreciated as precious comodities, and when those comodities are taken for granted, they quickly become perishable.
mountain man
December 28th, 2011
6:14 pm
“You’ve blamed the students for failure to learn. You’re blaming the victims.”
If these students are coming to school every day, on time, and paying attention and doing their homework (because their PARENTS make them), and not being disruptive, and THEN they are not doing well, I will believe that the teachers are then at fault. But when you have the above conditions, you are in the suburbs and making AYP is not a problem and cheating is not a problem. If you want to address why inner-city students are not making progress, address the above issues first. These inner-city youths are NOT the victims – they choose their paths themselves.
mountain man
December 28th, 2011
6:26 pm
“You’re either a cheating teacher or you’re married to one”
Actually, neither. But I have a lot of sympathy for all those teachers who are asked to do the impossible – teach inner-city youths who never come to school, don’t want to learn, think that learrning is only for “whiteys”, and are disruptive in class. Then when they can’t do the impossible – they are told their pay and their job is on the line. Just telling teachers to “teach” these kids that aren’t even in class is just like telling people to “just say no” to sex – it is asking the impossible without giving any details on HOW to achieve what you want.
Ed Johnson
December 28th, 2011
9:37 pm
“Just telling teachers to ‘teach’ these kids that aren’t even in class is just like telling people to ‘just say no’ to sex – it is asking the impossible without giving any details on HOW to achieve what you want.”
Well said, mountain man.
Deming (deming.org) was more to the point: “By what method?”
Additionally, let’s be mindful every school is not created equal. In fact, schools are inherently unequal for the simple reason they necessarily vary one from the other. So why would anyone expect schools to be equal?
Because schools vary, some will be more capable than others to absorb and deal effectively, or not, with the variety among their charges that show up, as well as don’t show up, at school each day. So a major challenge for schools is to learn to continually improve their capability to absorb and deal effectively with whatever the nature of the variety. The operative principle, here, is “schools that learn” and not necessarily “schools that need more funding” or whatever presumptive quick-fix. Also, by “variety” I do not mean the pc word “diversity.”