April 2009 Archives

Brad Jupp, the senior academic adviser for the Denver Public Schools, will be heading to the department to serve as an adviser to Education Secretary Arne Duncan, according to this news story.

In 2004, Jupp helped broker the ProComp differentiated-pay system in Denver while an employee of the local teachers' union, and he continued to help oversee the program when he moved to DPS.

He'll be on loan from Denver during this time, the story says, and will be advising Duncan on teacher quality and teacher-effectiveness issues.

I think this is a pretty good sign that the Obama administration is serious about looking at pay models that break away from traditional step-and-lane salary schedules. From my experience working with Brad on a number of stories, he's also well versed in all the human-capital components of education, including hiring and retention, pay, teacher evaluation, and how retirement systems affect the flow of teachers and out of the workforce.

Posted by Stephen Sawchuk at 10:31 AM | Permalink | No Comments | TrackBacks (0)

Four private foundations—the Eli and Edythe Broad Foundation, the Ford Foundation, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation—will partner with the American Federation of Teachers through its Innovation Fund, representatives of the foundations and the AFT announced this afternoon.

The private-foundation contributions, in addition to the AFT's down payment of $1 million, bring the fund's total to $2.8 million. Funds are available for local affiliates to "incubate promising ideas to improve schools," AFT President Randi Weingarten said.

She gave a couple of possible examples: Districts and teachers could propose a new way of evaluating teachers that would incorporate evidence of student achievement. Or they could come up with a school-turnaround model akin to the Fresh Start project in Chicago or the now-defunct New York City chancellor's district.

Both Weingarten and the foundation folks spoke a lot about the importance of working together and collaboration. Weingarten, clearly echoing her National Press Club speech earlier this year, said the accepted applications will be "different, innovative, unique, out-of-the-box, and, yes, have a risk attached to them."

"Some [individuals] who describe [unions] as obstacles to change, obstacles to reform—the innovation fund should put that argument to rest," Weingarten continued.

She added that the different stakeholders engaged in school reform should "start working together rather than squabbling about who is and isn't the reformer."

Both she and Adam Urbanski, the president of the Rochester, N.Y., affiliate who will serve as the fund's executive director, were quick to minimize the fact that AFT's education-reform objectives haven't always been in line with those of the private foundations. (Broad and Gates, for instance, were said to be primed to offer financial support behind D.C. Chancellor Michelle Rhee's two-tiered pay proposal, although as far as I know, neither foundation ever confirmed that on the record.)

I asked Weingarten who will have the final say over which projects get financed, because it's clearly possible that local affiliates might promote something that makes other locals or the national office cringe.

"We are a big tent," Weingarten said about her union. "Many districts experiment in different ways. We encourage that, and have encouraged it as long as I can remember."

Although an advisory body will have input into the decisionmaking process, an executive board that includes Weingarten and other AFT officials get to make the final call on which applications win approval.

She said that the fund plans to make its first grants this September, concurrent with its second advisory-board meeting.

While beginning her remarks this afternoon, Ms. Weingarten joked, "This is not an announcement about switching parties," referring to Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter's defection from the Republican to the Democratic Party. An aside, to be sure, but as this AP story notes, there are some interesting labor implications here. Though the Dems are inching closer to a filibuster-proof number of senators, Specter isn't a supporter of the Employee Free Choice Act, which would make it easier for unions to organize. Read a bit more about the teachers' union implications of the bill here.

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If you were a confident, highly effective educator, would you agree to take on a class size of 25 rather than 20, if you got a significant pay boost? How about 30 students? 35?

That's basically the idea behind a new white paper released by the Phoenix, Ariz.-based Goldwater Institute, a conservative-leaning think tank. (The paper doesn't appear to be on the Web site just yet, but it should be soon.)

Some of the ideas it raises you've probably heard before: Using "value-added" test-score growth as the basis of a merit-based pay system for teachers, with both schoolwide and individual growth targets. But the paper also raises this intriguing idea: Once you have a reliable system for identifying the most effective teachers, why not give more kids access to those teachers?

Using per-pupil funding for charter schools in Arizona, the paper suggests that a highly effective teacher would receive two-thirds of a student's per-pupil allocation in his or her salary, or about $5,200, for each additional student she takes on. (The remaining third would go to the school.) Combined with a merit-pay scheme, this system could net our best educators salaries of upwards of $100,000 a year, and allow more U.S. students to be taught by the best teachers out there, the paper suggests.

Sound far-fetched? Well, independent of the report, I was on the phone last week with a source who was telling me about teacher contracts that include language on class size and that require teachers who end up with larger class sizes to receive additional compensation. In practice, the source told me, a principal will ask some of the good teachers before the beginning of the school year if they'd be OK with taking on some additional students and receiving the pay bonuses. It's one way, the source suggested, a district could save money in tough times, rather than hiring a new teacher.

Both of the papers' ideas are likely to be controversial, especially with the national teachers' unions. The unions don't like the idea of performance-based pay based on these value-added gains, and are also proponents of class-size reduction. (See here and here for background.)

But on the other hand, it seems like this could offer some relief to the great class-size reduction debate that continually seems to plague K-12 education. This debate centers on whether it's better to have smaller classes, which has generally been the U.S.'s main teacher-quality solution, or to have fewer, more highly trained and effective teachers.

Aside from the obvious political challenges, the paper also outlines a couple of cultural challenges to raising class sizes. In a few focus groups conducted by the institute, researchers found that parents really seem wedded to smaller classes, even after they've been apprised of the research that shows that teacher effectiveness in general trumps class size. In other words, there is a strong sociological element going on here that will make pushing this idea forward a lot tougher.

Posted by Stephen Sawchuk at 11:04 AM | Permalink | 5 Comments | TrackBacks (0)

My colleague Sean Cavanagh has a great item up on Obama's speech at the National Academy of Sciences. Here's Obama on the idea of attracting science professionals into the classroom:

“Let's create new pathways for experienced professionals to go into the classroom,” the president said. “There are, right now, chemists who could teach chemistry, physicists who could teach physics, statisticians who could teach mathematics. But we need to create a way to bring the expertise and the enthusiasm of these folks–-folks like you–into the classroom.”

He could be referring to "career-changers" who decide to enter teaching full time. But perhaps he was also referring to those physicists and chemists who LIKE their jobs and want to be more involved in schools without necessarily leaving their labs?

I remember that for years the Bush administration had a proposal for "adjunct" teachers, basically professionals who might teach a few high school classes here and there. A Democratic-controlled Congress finally included the program in the Higher Education Act bill, signed last year. But appropriators haven't doled out funds to it yet.

As far as I can recall, the teachers' unions weren't all that hot on this idea when first proposed. It'd be interesting to hear what the president of the American Federation of Teachers, Randi Weingarten, makes of the concept. After all, while she was a rising star in the New York affiliate, she taught history part time at Clara Barton High School in Brooklyn. Sounds kinda adjunct-y to me.

Posted by Stephen Sawchuk at 7:48 AM | Permalink | 1 Comment | TrackBacks (0)

From Guest Blogger Liana Heitin

In outlining how schools should use stimulus aid, during a speech at the University of Northern Iowa in Cedar Falls on Friday, Secretary of Education Duncan emphasized extra pay for teachers who help with staff development and an extension of school time.

"You can identify your best teachers and pay them to coach their colleagues who are having trouble," said Duncan, according to the Associated Press.

But while standout teachers will organically emerge in any school, identifying and labeling “the best” becomes thorny when money is involved, as the never-ending debate over performance pay has proven. In fact, one New Hampshire district steered so far from rewarding performance over a more concrete factor—seniority—that it laid off a Teacher of the Year candidate (though the school board has since reversed this decision).

It seems that the development of quality teacher evaluation systems—which unions, district leaders, and teachers can agree upon—should be the number one priority for those seeking merit-based reform (see Stephen’s story on the quality of evals here). Initiatives such as Duncan’s will remain in the realm of controversy until these systems are in place.

Duncan also called for longer school days, weeks, and years, adhering to a “more is better” mindset. Perhaps this appeal, along with the requisite stimulus funds, will make its way to districts in Minnesota and Kansas that are adopting four-day school weeks in order to save money.

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The Oklahoma legislature just OK'd (sorry, I couldn't resist) the certification of teachers through the American Board for Certification of Teacher Excellence, a national alternative-route program.

Nine states now support the credential, which is granted after candidates pass content-area and pedagogy tests. (The candidates get help and coaching from a pool of experienced teachers prior to taking the tests.) The states are Florida, Idaho, Mississippi, Missouri, New Hampshire, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, South Carolina and Utah.

The bill, in fact, passed the Oklahoma House unanimously, 99-0. I'm told that's the first time legislation to approve the program has ever passed without some objection. Quite a far cry from 2004, when the California State Commission on Teacher Credentials voted not to move forward with ABCTE after teachers' unions and representatives of education schools protested.

David Saba, ABCTE's president, referenced a recent report by the National Commission on Teaching and America's future that found about half of Oklahoma's teaching force is composed of teachers older than 50.

"As they approach retirement age, it will be critical to have enough new teachers in the pipeline from all certification routes. We’re excited to work with school districts throughout Oklahoma to fill teaching vacancies with talented career-changers who can bring their real-world knowledge to the classroom," he said.

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The Los Angeles Daily News has this story up about the school board's efforts to take a look at tenure, evaluation, and seniority-based bumping.

Although these endeavors aren't expected to go anywhere, merely the fact that they have come this far seems to indicate a restlessness with how the current system works. The story says that parents have voiced concerns about the tendency of seniority-based layoffs to target young and probationary teachers.

But at least one parent agreed that teachers had a legitimate concern about the changes.

"Many parents feel the seniority should be revised but teachers need protection against discrimination and favoritism," the story quotes parent Diana Kunce, whose students attend Westwood Charter School. "We're interested in true collaboration and true reform. This is a complex issue."

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Remember that big hullabaloo in New York City last year when chancellor Joel I. Klein wanted to tie teacher-tenure decisions to student test-score growth? The union successfully lobbied the state legislature to prohibit the policy for two years while a study could be done on this data and its appropriateness for being included in these types of decisions.

Well, as it turns out, lawmakers aren't even going to give the issue serious examination now, according to this AP story.

I have requests for comments out to the New York City Department of Education and to the United Federation of Teachers. Teacher Beat will keep you posted as to what they say.

UPDATE 1: "We don't want to interfere with the Legislature's prerogatives," said David Cantor, a spokesman for the NYC DOE. "We have a good working relationship with the Legislature, and we look forward to future cooperation."

Posted by Stephen Sawchuk at 11:31 AM | Permalink | No Comments | TrackBacks (0)

At The Quick and the Ed, Chad Aldeman has an interesting post up about how steep salary schedules affect the ebb and flow of teachers into and out of the profession.

I wrote a story not long ago about how most pay systems are "backloaded," with teachers earning degrees for longevity and for earning degrees, neither of which is particularly well correlated to teacher effectiveness. In other words, these systems reward veterans and those teachers who hold advanced degrees, regardless of whether those teachers are the most effective. They also exert pressure on teachers to stay in order to get the pay increases that accompany a certain service milestone or the completion of a degree.

Aldeman proposes a schedule that pays beginning teachers more (such as New York City's) and does away with most of these salary differentials and would get rid of the perverse incentive to stay in the profession longer:

"Unlike districts with hard plateaus, the proposed schedules reserve small bonuses from years 11-25. And, instead of large arbitrary increases before and after multiple years of stagnation, the new schedules follow a gentle, predictable curve that places no extra emphasis on any one year. Teachers who felt burned-out after year 19, for example, would feel no strong financial compulsion to stay an additional year."

The only quibble I have with his analysis is that for many teachers, even if the salary schedule was retooled, there would still be a strong financial compulsion to stay: their pension system. Defined-benefit pensions become much more lucrative if a teacher stays until the early-retirement mark.

I just wrote a companion piece to the salary story focusing on the way pension systems exert this kind of push and pull on hiring. Like salaries, defined-benefit pension plans strongly favor veterans, and as the economists quoted in the story argue, that ties up the money that could be spent on other options, such as higher salaries for novices. Such plans can also hinder attempts to attract midcareer talent, because those individuals frequently have to sacrifice their employer contributions if they move to a different state, they say.

And I could be wrong, but is it possible that one reason it's so difficult to fire a tenured teacher because the date the teacher separates from the system literally means a difference in hundreds of thousands of dollars of net pension wealth?

This is wonky but important stuff, if you consider that 80% to 85% of a district's budget pays for salary and compensation. More and more, though, we see interest among districts to consider whether or not that money is aligned to their goals for recruiting, retaining, and developing good teachers and increasing student achievement.

UPDATED: Chad writes in to point out that I missed a section in the full paper that talks about the confluence of backloaded pensions and salaries, especially in states like Florida that tilt especially heavily in this direction. He also writes that in the Sunshine State, this arrangement is a "win-win" for the district and the union during contract negotiations: The state, not the district, picks up the unfunded pension liabilities caused by increases to salaries. (Denver, which is the example I used in my story, has its own pension system, so it wouldn't be able to shift these costs to the states. But most districts fall under a statewide pension program.)

Posted by Stephen Sawchuk at 2:32 PM | Permalink | No Comments | TrackBacks (0)

Just what kind of say will teachers and teachers' unions have on how the various stimulus dollars are spent, especially the $5 billion in competitive grants meant to spearhead new reform efforts?

That was one of the main themes at a seminar held yesterday by the Albert Shanker Institute, a think-tank affiliated with the American Federation of Teachers.

For many of the union leaders, superintendents, and academics who attended the seminar, this was their first opportunity to hear about the stimulus directly from an Obama administration representative, Marshall "Mike" Smith.

A few of the guests wondered aloud if the stimulus is based on an inherent contradiction: it's asking districts and states to plan carefully and thoughtfully for long-term reform, while requiring that they spend the money in just two years. One guest said it is contributing to strained relationships between unions, superintendents, school boards and the press locally.

Another put it more succinctly: "Quite obviously the priority goes to academic shovel-ready projects," quipped Mary Cathryn Ricker, the president of the St. Paul Federation of Teachers. She said she worried that the pressure to get funds out quickly would give vendors of pre-packaged or commercial approaches an edge over homegrown reform efforts.

"People are ready to make money rather than support union-management collaboration," she said.

It's not a small worry, as several guests chimed in to say they're already being bombarded with solicitations from the major textbook and test publishers.

The conversation quickly shifted to the discretionary pots of money, including the $200 million Teacher Incentive Fund, the $4.35 billion state "Race to the Top" Fund and the $650 million district-innovation fund, where the administration will have more control over how they dole out the money.

Following up on Ricker's point, an associate professor of labor studies at Rutgers University in New Jersey, Saul A. Rubinstein, asked Smith if the competitive applications or RFPs for the $5 billion fund would require collaboration among districts and unions. Such a requirement could result in innovative plans with strong teacher buy-in, and possibly produce more innovative plans with better implementation, he suggested.

Smith said officials are still considering the shape of the RFP, but he said the administration might even release draft RFPs for comment before putting out a final one.

Although the debate didn't get to this level of detail, I gather that union leaders would favor a requirement that these plans be collectively bargained, which would put a legal framework around them and presumably help with sustainability.

This point about collective bargaining may seem like hair-splitting, but it's an important distinction. Take the Bush administration's first RFP for the Teacher Incentive Fund grant, a federal performance-pay program. It gave additional points to applications that demonstrated buy-in from local communities and unions, but it didn't absolutely require that the plans be collectively bargained.

Subsequently, the National Education Association said it had heard complaints from a local in Eagle County, Colo., that it hadn't been adequately consulted in the design of that district's TIF program.

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Sharon Robinson, the president of the American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education, had some follow-up comments on this post, in which I wrote about how some states "gamed" the teacher-college accountability requirements in the Higher Education Act. Robinson has a different take:

"Under the previous law, universities had to report passage of all graduates on state licensing exams, even candidates for licensure that had not completed the program. Under the new law, universities must report scores for those who have completed required course work. This change ... makes the implications of pass-rates more directly related to program quality and accountability. ...

Most programs will continue to require some aspect of the licensing process as a graduation requirement. This same process is evidenced in many medical schools. Part I of the medical licensing process is usually undertaken after the second year of medical school. If the candidate does not pass that exam, many programs dismiss the student. What some have called 'gaming' the system, is really an effort to make passage of the exam meaningful so that universities can respond. If the student does not benefit from the instruction, they need to know and be supported in remediation or supported in selecting another career path."

She pointed out that AACTE supported the new, tougher accountability requirements instituted in the 2008 reauthorization bill. In addition to the new requirement referenced above, states now must report scale scores on the tests, which presumably will show whether states have set that bar high or low.

Fair enough, but it will be interesting to see how states and programs themselves respond if a significant number of candidates do fail to pass these exams. Ms. Robinson referenced one such example: the teacher-preparation program at the University of the District of Columbia. The UDC president has said he will close the school's teacher-education program because it graduates only 8 percent of its teacher-candidates, many because they couldn't pass a licensing exam.

"I hope the City Council and other community leaders will support this move and either provide the resources necessary to help students admitted be successful in the program and in meeting licensing requirements, or simply not offer the program. Other states should take note," Robinson writes.

What I'm now wondering about is what a program or state should do if it graduates only 50 percent of its teacher-candidates. That seems like a tougher call than where a program is obviously in trouble, as in D.C.

The secretary of education, Arne Duncan, and James Cibulka, the president of the group that accredits about half the nation's teacher colleges, have both recently said they support the closing of poor-quality teacher-prep programs.

Posted by Stephen Sawchuk at 11:55 AM | Permalink | 1 Comment | TrackBacks (0)

From Guest Blogger Liana Heitin

A messy (and bizarre) certification case in Texas is fueling the fire for opponents of alternative-pathway programs with flexible requirements. See a previous article about this ongoing debate here.

Lisa Ashmore received her bachelor's degree from Louisiana Baptist University—a school that is not accredited by the Texas Education Agency. She was, however, accepted by iteachTexas, an alternative-preparation company, and recommended for state certification after completing her required training courses. In 2003, the TEA approved her teaching certification.

TEA recently discovered Ashmore’s unaccredited degree (in what was likely part of an audit of the charter school where Ashmore is now the special education director, though this is unclear from the Dallas Morning News report). The state agency is seeking to revoke her teaching license.

Both TEA and iteachTexas are blaming each other for the oversight. Ashmore will retain her job pending an administrative hearing scheduled for August.

What do you think? Is it the state education department’s or the private training company’s obligation to review a candidate’s background? Should the education department trust private companies’ vetting processes?

Does Ashmore deserve immunity since she’s now an experienced teacher?

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D.C. Chancellor Michelle Rhee, American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten, and Washington Teachers' Union President George Parker just announced that a mediator will help settle differences over the shape of their contract.

Kurt Schmoke, Dean of Howard University School of Law and former Baltimore mayor, will work to resolve "outstanding issues" on the table, according to an AFT statement.

No word yet as to whether this means that that either the district or the AFT has declared a formal impasse—an event that triggers an arbitration process—or whether this is more of an informal conflict-resolution kind of thing.
UPDATE: AFT reports the contract is not at impasse.

Readers of this blog will know that part of the issue has been Ms. Rhee's plans to create a two tiered pay proposal, which hinged on some teachers giving up tenure for a year for the chance to earn bonuses, and an evaluation based in part on test scores. The union's counterproposal scrapped those features in favor of a peer-assistance-and review system, an expedient dismissal process for ineffective teachers (which the union never described in detail), a career ladder, and some kind of alternative-pay model.

Posted by Stephen Sawchuk at 6:01 PM | Permalink | 7 Comments | TrackBacks (0)

The National Governors Association just announced that it has selected six states to participate in a "policy academy" to create new methods for compensating teachers.

Such methods could include performance-based pay, but also higher pay for teachers who: take on tough assignments; teach in shortage fields such as math and science; and assume "master" teacher roles.

They would include a new type of alternative pay I haven't heard about before: "Retention" pay, a one-time boost for teachers that make it through the challenging early years of their teaching careers.

A statement from the NGA says that the academy will pair governors' education-policy staff with chief state school officers, teachers' union leaders, and national experts to create strategies within the states.

And it's good timing, too, with $200 million for alternative compensation included in the federal stimulus package.

Posted by Stephen Sawchuk at 3:57 PM | Permalink | No Comments | TrackBacks (0)

Here we go again.

The Washington Teachers' Union/American Federation of Teachers is, apparently, running another poll about the contract D.C. Chancellor Michelle Rhee proposed last summer, and about the AFT's counterproposal. And, just as it was last summer, the union is being accused of push-polling.

Without seeing the poll questions, it's hard to comment on this account of the poll. But, I have to say that I'm starting to really feel for the D.C. teachers that are stuck in limbo in the meantime.

The clock is ticking...

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My extremely talented colleagues are giving Teacher Beat a run for its money! Sean Cavanagh and Debra Viadero have must-read items about teachers up at their respective Ed Week blogs.

Over at the brand-new and already very popular Inside School Research, Debbie looks at an updated study of Teach For America teachers with a comparison group.

This study's methodology was questioned when it first came out, so its researchers incorporated a bunch of new data and re-ran the analysis. I won't spoil the results, but I will say that it's good news for TFA.

Over at Curriculum Matters, Sean Cavanagh discusses one science teacher's concern that professional learning communities in science aren't focused enough to drive improvements in teacher performance.

Since the PLC model of professional development has become really popular and could even appear in the next iteration of the No Child Left Behind law, this is an important point. What are the key features of a professional learning community that make it work effectively? How narrow of a focus do they need to have? And how do they need to change based on subject area and grade level?

Why not post a comment and tell us?

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From guest blogger Liana Heitin

The National Commission on Teaching and America’s Future just released a study indicating that half of our nation’s teachers could retire in the next 10 years and calling for districts to restructure their hiring practices. Check out the article I wrote about it for teachermagazine.org here.

Predictions about en masse retirements come up every so often, and I tend to be wary when they are apocalyptic in scope. (NCTAF head Tom Carroll even warns of a “retirement tsunami.”) As Sam Dillon notes in The New York Times, the Department of Education made a similar prediction in 1999 and nothing materialized. Also, see the five-part series Education Week did on the subject that same year.

Yet in speaking with Carroll over the phone, it became clear that his ideas are grander and more progressive than the report could contain. He wants an education overhaul, in which classes are fluid and taught by a variety of people: teacher apprentices, master teachers, content experts, and neighborhood volunteers. It’s an idea that could begin in an education theory class, yet Carroll is hoping the bleak retirement picture—and the dangling stimulus money—could help bring it to fruition.

Some of his ideas are revolutionary. Imagine a biology professor running in from his university lab to teach a high school lesson on cellular respiration. Yet it all seems quite far away.

In some ways, Carroll is synthesizing practices that are already in place. The report focuses on building collaborative learning teams, and right now, professional learning communities are quite in fashion. Mentoring and coaching, also part of Carroll’s plan, are staples in most districts, and some are even using retirees for the job.

So while it’s possible that the retirement numbers will be less than catastrophic, Carroll does have ideas on retaining veteran and beginning teachers that are already proving valuable.

Posted by Stephen Sawchuk at 11:12 AM | Permalink | 1 Comment | TrackBacks (0)

The Washington Post has this story up about the new teacher-evaluation system that D.C. Chancellor Michelle Rhee and her team are devising.

The story does a good job talking about the benefits and perils of a "value added" system that uses test-score growth to estimate teacher effectiveness, a model I've written about before. But it doesn't elaborate on one of the most interesting pieces Rhee has proposed: to use a system of "impartial master teachers" to observe and evaluate teachers' practices, rather than a principal.

At a recent Washington event, Rhee gave a few more details about how this system of teacher observations might work. The master teachers wouldn't have ties to particular schools, and would be grade-level and subject-matter experts, so that teachers are evaluated by someone who knows the content area and the grade-level expectations of that teacher, rather than an administrator who might not have experience in the teacher's area, she said at a research conference sponsored by the National Council for Teacher Quality, in Washington.

The WaPo story notes that the city pretty much holds the reins on the teacher-evaluation system, which means that the Washington Teachers' Union/American Federation of Teachers can't do much to protest it apart from filing an unfair labor-practice complaint. AFT President Randi Weingarten is said to want to include the teacher-evaluation system under the scope of bargaining. Although Rhee has gathered input from teachers, that's still a far cry from a collectively bargained evaluation system. I can definitely imagine Weingarten resisting a system that isn't negotiated as part of the contract.

On the other hand, Weingarten recently told me that neither test scores nor principal observations should be the only factor for determining teacher performance. Instead, they should be based on multiple measures. And since Rhee's system incorporates both growth-based test scores and the aforementioned master-teacher observations, perhaps there's some common ground here.

Let's hope we'll have more details on this soon. At the NCTQ conference, Rhee said she and the AFT were hammering out dates to return to the bargaining table. Don't touch that dial...

Posted by Stephen Sawchuk at 10:49 AM | Permalink | No Comments | TrackBacks (0)

Elizabeth Green over at Gotham Schools has a great item about a Queens charter school whose leaders say its union didn't give it the heads-up that charter schools are likely to have their funding cut in the state budget. Here's her kicker:

"Most charter schools in New York City are not represented by teachers unions. ... But the union has fought to bring charter schools teachers into its fold. Their slow but steady inclusion has put the union in the tricky position of on the one hand lobbying for limits on charter schools, while, on the other hand, representing some charter school staff."

Randi Weingarten, the president of the United Federation of Teachers, the city teachers' union, said in a February letter that she did not support unequal cuts to charters vs. traditional public schools. Still, like performance-based pay, charters increasingly seem like an area in which unions in the Obama era are going to have to tread cautiously or risk being accused of blowing hot and cold.

Posted by Stephen Sawchuk at 10:27 AM | Permalink | No Comments | TrackBacks (0)

Andy Rotherham has a thoughtful post on the teacher-evaluation reporting proposal that the Education Department will soon be opening for public comment. Rotherham's worry, and it's a legitimate one, is that this new reporting requirement in and of itself won't have much of an effect:

"Federal policymakers have tried that approach on a range of issues from higher education to teacher education to all manner of K-12 issues and it’s had little effect. The states are pretty good at gaming the data ... Besides, is the problem really a lack of information about the problems per se? I don’t think anyone influential is sitting around wondering whether or not teacher evaluations are any good ..."

A case in point involves the teacher-college accountability requirements that began in the 1998 Higher Education Act, which compelled those institutions to report passage rates on licensing exams. Rather than using this data to identify and close poor programs, states lowered their cut scores and a lot of prep programs ended up making passage of the tests a graduation requirement, so it didn't amount to much. (The reauthorized HEA tries to address this, and I pushed Secretary of Ed Duncan to elaborate on it) in a recent interview.

I can't help but think the administration knows about these loopholes, though. It will be interesting to see if they actually put teeth in this proposal. And surely there are district officials and teachers' unions out there that can agree on a better evaluation that can be used both for instructional improvement and for accountability purposes, like those in the Teacher Advancement Program.

I'll be doing a follow-up story on the evaluation issue sometime in the next few weeks, so stay tuned. In the meantime, post your thoughts here, or e-mail me at ssawchuk@epe.org. Who knows—maybe we can talk!

Posted by Stephen Sawchuk at 10:07 AM | Permalink | 2 Comments | TrackBacks (0)

Chalk one up for the American Federation of Teachers. Just as things have gotten a bit dicey in AFT's bid to unionize charter schools in New York City, three Chicago charter schools—the Wrightwood, Northtown Academy and Ralph Ellison campuses of the Civitas Schools’ Chicago International Charter Schools—have served notice to state and district officials that they will unionize.

Three-quarters of the teaching staff at the campuses signed authorization cards to be represented by the Chicago Alliance of Charters Teachers and Staff, an affiliate of the Illinois chapter of the AFT. The state law allows this "card-check" method of organizing charter schools as opposed to secret-ballot elections.

The national charter school/unionization story is a really interesting one. It's hard to know how involved AFT President Randi Weingarten was in this particular effort, but it's probably fair to say she's carefully watching how the Obama administration's efforts to expand charter schooling will play out to determine how AFT can participate.

Posted by Stephen Sawchuk at 2:47 PM | Permalink | 1 Comment | TrackBacks (0)

From Guest Blogger Liana Heitin

For those who know a little about the Teacher Advancement Program but have had trouble discerning the nuances of the initiative (like me), take a look at Stephen’s recent article, which gives the best explanation I have seen.

As poignantly noted, when people hear TAP, they often translate “performance pay”—yet the crux of the model is in the word “advancement.” For some teachers, the open-door policy and constant accountability that enforce the culture of advancement are too much to bear, so they leave—or self-select out. Could this be the answer to President Obama’s call to get bad teachers out of the classroom? Think of it this way: have you ever had a burnt out, idle, or knowingly unproductive teacher invite you into his or her room for an observation? How do “bad” teachers you know react to impromptu visits from colleagues and administrators?

The advancement part of the formula also has possibilities in the realm of teacher retention. In reading about TAP, I found myself thinking of some talented teachers I know who would like to ascend the career ladder but are not interested in becoming administrators (who wants to deal with budgets, staffing, and policy-setting anyway?). Many feel as if they’ve hit a glass ceiling and plan to look outside of the schools when they are ready to make an upward move. TAP, with its incremental progression from “career” to “master” teacher, has the potential to hold on to these teachers by allowing them to exercise their leadership skills from outside the principal’s office.

Maybe I’m being overeager, but it seems like TAP could also be the beginnings of an effort to increase collaboration among teachers in the U.S., who spend far less time working together than teachers in other high-performing countries. And TAP also provides a framework for in-house peer-driven professional development, which is especially valuable in the current budget crunch (see the Teacher Professional Development Sourcebook for more on PD in lean times).

Ok, so even if TAP isn’t the education magic bullet (although some say it’s narrowing the achievement gap as well. . . ), it does have quite a few promising features. I’ll keep my eyes peeled for more TAP-related stories and bring them back to Teacher Beat.

Posted by Liana Heitin at 11:24 AM | Permalink | No Comments | TrackBacks (0)

From Guest Blogger Liana Heitin

In this climate of rampant layoffs, most people are concentrated on finding ways to keep teachers in the classroom. Yet (and it seems hardly controversial to point out) not all teachers should stay. The St. Petersburg Times reports that when budget cuts are not an issue, firing a teacher can be more than a little difficult.

Ron Matus of The Times tells the story of Roy Sachse, a tenured P.E. teacher in Florida with a history of inappropriate behavior. In one 18-month period, Sachse reportedly sent a note to a female student asking her to meet him behind a dumpster, was accused of cussing out a co-worker, was arrested on charges of stealing a sandwich, and was overheard threatening to pull down a girl’s pants. Of the 20 counts of misconduct against Sachse throughout his career, 11 were deemed substantiated.

Sachse still holds his job. And the most punitive action taken against him in his 22 years of teaching was a one-day suspension two years ago. (The entire article is worth a read, if for no other reason than shock-factor.)

While few people will defend such conduct, teachers reading this may be thinking of a co-worker who was punished or fired for a far more trivial transgression—or perhaps one that was wholly unsubstantiated. See this story on Julie Amero, the substitute teacher who lost her teaching license for exposing students to pornographic images when her computer was bombarded by pop-up ads.

But which case is happening more frequently—bad teachers getting by or good teachers being unfairly penalized? D.C. schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, and others looking to change tenure policies seem to think the former.

What do you think? Are teachers given more leeway than employees of other professions? Have tenure laws moved from shielding teachers against biased school boards and parents to protecting teachers indiscriminately? Is it necessary to protect teachers like Sachse to make sure teacher safeguards remain in place?

Posted by Liana Heitin at 2:10 PM | Permalink | No Comments | TrackBacks (0)

The stimulus guidance is up, and it contains what to me seems like a real jaw-dropper on the teacher-quality front. To receive their second cut of state stabilization funds, states will need to show they are capable of reporting the number and percentage of teachers and principals rated at each performance level under each local district's teacher-evaluation system. The federal government has, in the past, been very hands-off of teacher evaluation.

I can see this being a real challenge on a number of fronts. First off, I'm not even sure how many districts keep computerized records of the results of these evaluations. It probably varies, but right now, evaluation is pretty much a personnel thing.

Secondly, as EdSector's Tom Toch has noted, teacher-evaluation instruments in most districts are exceptionally poor. Many do a terrible job of distinguishing different levels of performance. Many are not correlated to any definition of good teaching.

We also know that administrators have been reluctant to give teachers poor ratings on their evaluation systems (see this post on San Francisco, for instance). It probably won't pass the laugh test if districts report that 100 percent of their teachers are deemed to "exceed expectations," or whatever the top rating is, when they've got schools that aren't passing testing thresholds.

So what this could do is spur some hard conversations on what teacher evaluations should look like.

It'll be interesting to see what the teachers' unions have to say about this. They've historically been wary of evaluations that use student-performance information, and the federal requirements also require states to note which districts' systems include student-achievement outcomes.

I've got calls out to Toch and the teachers' unions, Let's see what they have to say.

Posted by Stephen Sawchuk at 12:01 PM | Permalink | 5 Comments | TrackBacks (0)

There seems to be a lot of interest these days in on-the-job teacher training provided through professional learning communities, or teams of teachers that meet to review student data and samples of student work and compare teaching strategies. Now some districts in Utah are rearranging their school schedules to give teachers paid time to work this way, according to this story.

Two of the districts will start Fridays 60 to 90 minutes late, or end school early, to facilitate the common planning time.

The story gives some great examples of how this kind of professional development can be utilized. Teachers in one school, the story notes, decided to come up with some common math formative assessments. When they compare the results from these test, the teachers determine which teaching strategies were more fruitful.

Posted by Stephen Sawchuk at 9:55 AM | Permalink | 1 Comment | TrackBacks (0)

The Charleston Daily Mail has this interesting story about a bill in the legislature that would allow counties to conduct detailed interviews with teacher candidates before deciding to hire them. Right now, the story says, districts can only check to verify coursework and training. All other decisions are made on the basis of a checklist of teacher evaluations, qualifications, and seniority.

The teachers' unions and a member of the Charleston school board both said the proposal would open the door to favoritism and nepotism by county boards of education. The teachers unions have vowed to fight the bill.

But one can also see the opposite side of this argument. What if you've got special skills that could be used in a low-income school that aren't captured by the checklist? What if you're a superintendent looking for a bright young energetic teacher for a new offering? What if, as often happens in other fields, you just get a sense from interviews that one candidate is going to be a better fit than another?

Does your district hire teachers using a similar system? Tell us what you think about it.

Posted by Stephen Sawchuk at 9:43 AM | Permalink | No Comments | TrackBacks (0)