Tuesday, May 11, 2010

Education Rant

If there is one thing I am passionate about more than anything else in politics, it is education. I had five years of experience in the classroom- I know the ins and outs and what happens "behind the scenes" if you will. And so I am pretty peeved about Senate Bill 191 that will probably pass tonight, and I had to vent. My letters to the editor once again did not get printed, so that leaves my blog- where all my letters are accepted:)
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Here is the jist of the bill for those of you who are out of state:
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Basically, students will now take a state mandated test every year for every subject to see if they have improved. If their scores do not improve, the teacher has 2 years to try and improve the scores, and if they are unable to do so, it will supposedly be easier to fire them. So, it's being dubbed the "teacher tenure"- which has gotten everybody all excited, because we all know that teacher tenure (which doesn't even really exist) is the source of all of our education's problems- not parents, not administrators, not No Child Left Behind- just teacher tenure (I am being sarcastic here).
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Here is a super small list of the problems with this bill:
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1. Students in EVERY grade (including kindergarten) and every subject (including high school jazz band) now have to take a state test- EVERY year. Can I just say, I do not want my kindergartner sitting through hours long tests just so an administrator can maybe fire 1 extra teacher a year in two years.
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2. This bill does NOT give administrators any more power to fire teachers than they already have- in fact, it gives them LESS power. Currently, a teacher can be fired in ONE year if they get two semesters worth of bad evaluations in a row. This bill has been so watered down that it does LESS to get rid of bad teachers than more- completely defeating the purpose of having such a stupid bill.
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3. This is going to cost tons of money- money we don't have. And I am talking millions- in the middle of a huge budget crisis where they have already cut special ed programs, bussing, sports, and everything inbetween.
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4. Teachers in my district have already- this year alone- taken pay cuts, pay freezes, a massive loss to retirement and benefits, and every first year teacher has been cut as a result of budget cuts. Now, they want to take away the ONE thing teachers have left: job security. At what point are people going to say they no longer want to be a teacher? We already have a MASSIVE teacher shortage nationwide, what incentive are we giving college students to go into teaching???????? I can say unequivicolly that I am glad I am no longer teaching due to all of this crap that they have to deal with, and SEVERAL of my teacher friends have said they are ready to quit because of this madness. When does it end??????
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5. This bill does NOT have to do with firing bad teachers. Administrators already have that power- like I said, all a teacher needs is two bad evaluations in a row to be fired- THAT IS IT!!!!!! When we were dealing with teacher tenure on a district level and I was doing work with the union (which I LOVE), an administrator said, "this isn't about firing bad teachers. It's about firing average teachers." Hmmm....the real agenda comes out! I can understand wanting to get rid of bad teachers- but why do you need to get rid of "average" teachers? With the teacher crisis we have, we need every teacher we can get!! MOST teachers are average- that is the definition of average. Why not just provide better teacher training for those average teachers who are willing to put up with all the crap from students, parents, administrators, legislators, and the community instead of trying to get rid of them?
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6. If you want to get the "best" teachers out there, PAY THEM WHAT THEY ARE WORTH. SHOW THEM RESPECT. MAKE IT SO PEOPLE ACTUALLY WANT TO BE A TEACHER AND CAN SUPPORT THEIR FAMILY ON A TEACHERS WAGE. Then, you will have a massive surplus of teachers and more than 1 or 2 people would apply for each open position- and the best would rise to the top. Now, our top teachers are recruited by firms that will pay them more. For example, Apple computers actually recruits math teachers to go and work for them- offering them better pay, benefits, retirement, and WAY better hours. Pay them what they are worth, and you will never again have to worry about having a "bad" teacher in the classroom.
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7. Students have no buy-in to this test. This is a major problem with all standardized tests- there is no reason the student needs to try their best, but the school (and in this case teacher) gets punished based on how they do. During CSAP (or C-CRAP as I like to call it- our state tests), our best students would literally draw pictures where their essays should be because they just don't care.
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8. What about students who move? There are schools where literally 90% of students move in and out of the school. How is that fair- for a teacher to be punished based on students they only had in their class for two weeks? The bill exempts classes where 95% of students moved- but what about 94%? Hardly fair.
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Here is the editorial I wrote to both our community paper and The Denver Post:
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Dear Editor,
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SB 191 pits teachers against administrators in a volatile way. Forget, however, that the only thing administrators need to do is produce two negative evaluations in a row to fire a teacher. Forget that every administrator knows the "easy" and "effective" way to get rid of a teacher is to simply give them the worst classes, the worst duties, and the worst students and force them out. Forget for a moment that 50% of teachers quit in the first five years due to poor working conditions and low salaries, and that we are in the middle of a massive teacher shortage in this country. Forget that we should be desparately trying to attract and retain teachers instead of thinking of more ways to get rid of them.
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What about our students? Let's think about them for a moment. The current legislation will require all students in every grade and every subject to take a standardized test. Do we really want kindergartners sitting through hours-long state mandated tests? Do we really want high school students forced to take standardized tests for every single subject- upwards of seven different subject areas a semester? At what point do we begin to fight for our students and for the love of education? Teachers should have standards to meet. But the way to do that is by changing the evaluation process, not by sacrificing our students to the test demons.
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End letter.
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I am just so incredibly PISSED off at how teachers are treated. Especially where I live now, I can not believe what little respect people pay to the some of the most important members of our community. I can not believe teachers continue to be blamed for every problem, and that people actually believe this bill will do anything to help that. What a complete waste of money and resources, at a time when we need both of those the most. I am really pissed off about this, as you can tell.
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OK, I am done ranting.
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(and I will say again that comment moderation is on to avoid Chinese spammers not to filter anybody who disagrees with me- but, in case you can not tell by the tone of this post, I really do not want to debate this- I really just want to vent and get this anger that has built up inside of me out, so while I will post anti-teacher posts, I am going to mostly ignore them. Fair warning.)

4 comments:

  1. You know Christina, I took standardized tests in Kindergarten and it was no big deal. I distinctly remember bubbling a little here, a little there, copying a little on this part, etc. etc. :-) ha ha. I agree with you completely. It's amazing how politicians can get everyone fired up against teachers. Like we're the bad guys. All these idiots who have never been in a classroom or have forgotten what it was like in their race to the "top."

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  2. The biggest problem is that it is so easy to makes the teachers the scapegoats for poor student performance. That's what happens when the people who truly should be responsible for their own kids' performance look for ways to project their parental failures on other people.

    After all, it would be impossible to make a law stating that parents had to actually be involved in their children's education. It is much easier to make a law stating that government-employed teachers have to compensate for failure at home.

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  3. I am not going to take a side or comment on the debate. My kids have not been in US schools yet, but I can tell you that I value teachers who can challenge my kids and keep them interested in learning. Teaching to the lowest common denominator won't do that. I had some great teachers, but I also had my fair share of terrible ones. I had whole years where I felt like I didn't learn anything new. I do think teachers should get paid appropriately, be valued for all the work they do, and have a much higher respect level in general. It is such a complex problem, it will take people a lot smarter than me to fix it.

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