Archive for the ‘Teachers’ Category

I can’t help but be depressed at the continual AJC news stories about larger classes, fewer teachers and shorter calendars.

This story is about Cobb, a school system that has been an academic pace setter and a major factor in the county’s appeal to middle-class families. When these top systems start slashing, I worry even more about the future of education in Georgia.

Here is the latest report from the AJC:

After failing to reach agreement last week, the Cobb County school board held a special meeting Monday for another go at next year’s budget, and approved one with $841.9 million in spending.

The 2012-13 budget, which kicks in July 1, cuts 350 teaching positions. That should increase average class sizes at all grade levels by two students per teacher.

The new budget pulls back from other cuts that were contained in the tentative budget approved in April.

Instead of five furlough days, for instance, teachers and all other employees will get three. That will mean a …

Continue reading To cope with budget, Cobb shortens school year, raises class size and cuts teachers. Welcome to the new normal »

Gwinnett schools approved a budget today that calls for two unpaid furlough days for most employees, two extra students per classroom and nearly 600 fewer people on the payroll. Most of the job cuts will come from leaving open jobs unfilled.

According to the AJC:

Spending for day-to-day operations of the state’s largest school district will be $1.2 billion for the fiscal year that starts July 1, down $60.6 million from this year.

“It’s a very tough budget,” said Superintendent J. Alvin Wilbanks. “It’s one we have lots of concerns with, but it will allow us to continue to do what we need to do.”

The largest share of the savings — $43 million — will come from leaving vacant 585 jobs, where employees — mostly teachers — have retired, resigned or transferred, and adding an average of two students per classroom.

The system will save another $10 million by furloughing employees for a fourth straight year. The two unpaid furlough days will apply to all employees, with the exception …

Continue reading Gwinnett schools: Furlough days, larger classes and 585 unfilled jobs »

Education Week had a fascinating story about the lack of men entering teaching, even at a time when the field should be more attractive because of its relative stability in an economic downturn.

But, according to Ed Week, this downturn “seems to have worsened an already-vast gap between the numbers of men and women teachers, particularly in the early grades.”

My four children have had very few male teachers, although my two seventh graders have two this year.  Interestingly, that situation reverses in college where my two older children report having many more male professors and instructors.

Here is an excerpt of the article:

According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics’ 2011 Current Population Survey, men make up only 18.3 percent of elementary and middle school teachers and 2.3 percent of preschool and kindergarten instructors — a dip from the 2007 prerecession proportions of 19.1 percent in grades 1 to 8 and 2.7 percent in preschool and kindergarten. The numbers of …

Continue reading Is teaching still seen as women’s work? »

Mpaza S. Kapembwa of DeKalb  is a 2011 Cross Keys High School graduate who now attends Williams College.

He is a Gates Millennium Scholar, Coca Cola Scholar and Dell Scholar. This is the second piece he has written for the Get Schooled blog

By Mpaza S. Kapembwa

Our method of fixing problems in education today seems to be laying all the blame on our teachers. We have grown comfortable not being responsible. At the same time, we want all of the benefits of shared responsibility without sharing in the burden. We are quick to frown when someone wakes us up from a restful sleep. A teacher reminding us of our own responsibility is akin to the alarm going off in the wee hours of the morning. Parents see their dreams not being realized in their children and they lash out at the dream snatcher — the teacher.

When President Obama visited Seoul in 2009, he asked President Lee Myung-bak about his biggest challenge in education. Myung-bak said he wished parents didn’t care so much …

Continue reading A call for students to be more responsible for their learning »

Here is a second essay from the Teaching Georgia Writing Collective, a group of educators, parents, and concerned citizens who engage in public writing and teaching about education in Georgia.

The collective defines its goals as: 1) empowering educators to reclaim their workplace and professionalism, 2) empowering families to stand up for their children and shape the institutions their children attend each day, 3) empowering children and youth to have control over their education, and 4) enhancing the education of all Georgians. The number of participates is growing, representing at least six counties.

Here is the essay:

“If America can increase funding for libraries and librarians, I can only think that America has found one important way to rebuild itself.”

-Stephen Krashen

Stephen Krashen, along with many educational scholars, insists that investing in our libraries and librarians is crucial to building a strong and just America. Research points to high …

Continue reading Cuts to school libraries and staffs a sad chapter in education »

I am always surprised when parents tell me their kids have three to four hours of homework a night given the lack of evidence that homework enhances student achievement

Here is a piece about homework from Kenneth Goldberg,  a clinical psychologist and author of “The Homework Trap: How to Save the Sanity of Parents, Students and Teachers.”

By Kenneth Goldberg

As the world engages in a global homework debate, there are many parents whose major concern is not public policy, but what will happen at home tonight. They are not Tiger Moms, but ordinary parents who simply want the best for their children. These parents start out with the full intention of supporting the teachers and their children’s schools. Yet, something goes wrong along the way as they and their children fall into a homework trap.

The problem starts in elementary school. The notes come home, and the parents get “the call.” They meet with the teacher and make plans to make sure everyone is on the same page. …

Continue reading Plotting an escape from the homework trap »

One of the foundations of Georgia’s new teacher evaluation system will be classroom observations by administrators, which are supposed to occur twice a year and last 30 minutes each.

There are already doubts about whether these classroom visits will occur given the time constraints on principals or whether they will yield reliable information on teacher effectiveness. (See comment from the leader of the DeKalb teachers group that he is hearing complaints these observations are not happening as required in the pilot program under way.)

Here is new research that will add to the concerns. This is from Indiana University School of Education:

Classroom observation measures don’t necessarily provide a clearer picture of teacher effectiveness than value-added measures based on student test scores, according to a review of the most recent report from the Measures of Effective Teaching Project’s large-scale examination of teacher evaluation methods. The review was led by Cassandra …

Continue reading Do classroom observations of teachers give us reliable info? »

The APS cheating scandal has led the system to pursue principal firings in schools where there was widespread cheating by classroom teachers.

But some principals counter that they did not order teachers to cheat, so why are they to blame when their employees do the wrong thing. Are they responsible for the actions of their teachers? Even if they should have known something was amiss, what if they didn’t?

In the AJC story this week on her APS tribunal hearing, Slater Elementary School principal Selena Dukes Walton contended,  “I am not responsible for something I did not know about. I’m not responsible for the teacher.”

But in an interview with the AJC last week, APS Superintendent Erroll Davis said, “When principals say to me that ‘The investigators’ report said I wasn’t involved, why am I being removed from the job?’ I say, ‘Absolutely, you did not cheat but you failed. I put the malleable lives of young children in your hands and you failed.”’

Davis said, “You …

Continue reading Are principals accountable for the cheating on their watch? Should they be fired? »

A reader sent me this story out of the Albany Herald about the school system reimbursing a parent for a bond after a student was arrested for using a profanity toward a teacher. The reader wrote, “I think it’s a first for any school system and a new low for Dougherty.”

I was surprised to see a school system using its funds to pay bond for a student. The new story addresses the questions of the legality of such an expenditure.

It appears that the school-based police officer made the decision to arrest the student, and the administration did not agree. (The story says a request had been made to police to send the superintendent’s office all warrants for arrest of Dougherty County School System students.)

While this story is about the unique aspect of reimbursing a student’s bond, it also points to the more universal truth that high school principals and their school resource/police officers don’t always agree on how students should be disciplined or whether an arrest should …

Continue reading Dougherty system reimburses parent for student’s bond after profanity arrest at school »

What do our young people need to know?

That question was the centerpiece of the second major event that NBC Education Nation sponsored during in its visit to Atlanta this week. In a noon panel today at the Georgia Aquarium Monday hosted by NBC reporter David Gregory, Gov. Nathan Deal, Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed and U.S. Sen Johnny Isakson tackled the question.

The responses were fairly straightforward and essentially gave each politician an opportunity to tout their own efforts on behalf of education. Deal began by saying that the state has a constitutional obligation to educate its children. (I was surprised no teachers jumped to their feet then to ask if that constitutional obligation included adequate funding.)

The governor’s main theme was that Georgia schools were on their way to offering industry a deep and qualified workforce. He listed the various companies that have chosen to open new facilities in Georgia during his term, in part, he says, because they trust that they …

Continue reading NBC Education Nation: Second event on work skills today »