Teaching Profession

Oklahoma Paper Lauds D.C. Layoffs

By Bryan Toporek — August 05, 2010 1 min read
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Count The Oklahoman‘s editorial board as supporters of D.C. Schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee, whose recent teacher firings the paper calls “momentous.”

In an editorial published Aug. 2, the paper calls Rhee’s layoffs empowering, since “firing teachers because they do a poor job of teaching children isn’t exceedingly common.” The authors add that recent changes to Oklahoma’s education laws are designed to result in an evaluation system “that shows ineffective educators the door while rewarding standouts.”

“Meantime,” the article notes, “we’ll keep cheering for Rhee.”

For more on the D.C. firings, including questions about whether the teacher evaluation system reliably measured performance, check out this Teaching Now entry from last week.

A version of this news article first appeared in the Teaching Now blog.