Good teacher, bad teacher? Proper criteria? Hear from one Campbell Brown plaintiff.

[madfloridian]

The lawsuit by Campbell Brown and plaintiffs assumes that tenure protects "bad" teachers. I knew of teachers who lost tenure, but it was done without a lot of publicity. If it were a serious charge, then that teacher would be out of the classroom at once. Less serious charges might be handled with the teacher voluntarily resigning.

The parent judges the two teachers as to whether they give homework and provide the books. He then admits that the books were not in yet, the teacher did not have the materials yet. This method of judging assumes that all teachers have the personal resources to provide materials that the school district should be providing.

I always provided what I could, but no way I could provide textbooks. That gets very costly. This was kindergarten level. Still debate about how much homework is appropriate. How can a teacher by judged by the supplies that she provides?

He mentions that one compliments the child, the other doesn't. That argument has some merit, but not really that much.

Are these the proper criteria to use to put teachers jobs on the firing line?

They speak of data that proves that due process rights of teachers hurt students. Is there really data that proves that?

Is this what NY teachers are facing now? Being judged by criteria like this? My sympathy to them.

Where are the teachers' voices? Why is Campbell Brown getting so much air time? I only see teachers' arguments presented on forums and twitter.

[roody]

1. A couple of years ago, I heard a parent complimenting

a teacher. The parent's daughter was so happy to have a teacher who wore lipstick. We could use that for criteria. This was a third grade teacher.

[JEFF9K]

2. Maybe we should go back to the old system ...

of not judging teachers.

[msanthrope]

3. Ah...this was the father with twins...One had a teacher rated effective

the other, did not. And the differences they experienced were startling.

I find it interesting that you didn't mention that. Why didn't you? That's a fact debated at length in the lawsuit.

And yes....when one teacher is able to to procure textbooks, and the other doesn't bother, I understand why the parent has questions.

[July]

4. I don't understand your point here.

Teachers don't procure textbooks, school districts do. How is it a teacher's failure if books are not available?

[msanthrope]

5. It's the teachers fault if other teachers have the books, and they didn't bother to get them....

the lawsuit documents how these twins were put in different classrooms....one did well with an effective rated teacher, one did poorly with one who was not rated effective.

[madfloridian]

6. Let's see.

The district where I taught for several years made sure the magnet schools and charter schools had 2 sets of books....one for the classroom one to take home.

Our school in a high poverty area was not so lucky. We had one set of books in some areas. We had years old science and social studies texts.

This was how the district operated.

You are saying it was my fault that other teachers had proper books and I didn't.

Wow.

[msanthrope]

7. Uh....madflo...these kids were in the same school. Your example fails because you

are talking about different teachers in different schools. One teacher got the books...the other didn't bother.

You did read the lawsuit, right?

One twin got an effective teacher..the other did not. The differences were startling.

[madfloridian]

10. His reasons for judging seem very inadequate. Same school, different school, same principle....

You should not judge a teacher because she doesn't provide supplies when that is the job of the school and district.

Are you aware that some teachers can not afford to provide textbooks and other materials?

I am reading the parts of the lawsuit that refer to Keoni Wright. He seems to blame the difference on his twins by 3rd grade only on the teachers....yet even twins are different in various ways. He has already moved them from classes once, citing the reason as the teachers. He seems not to put much responsibility on his daughters.

He is saying that the one teacher was not effective because she did not give homework every night in Kindergarten, because she did not provide all the materials needed. That simply does not make good sense.

Welcome to the thread. I now leave it to you.

[msanthrope]

12. You "are reading" the lawsuit just now? He is saying

one teacher was not effective because that was how she was rated. Her district rated her as not effective...

You seem to blame the parent for "judging" but ignoring the fact that the teacher has already been judged....as not effective.

[joshcryer]

16. "not to put much responsibility on his daughters"

How much responsibility does a third grader merit on their own learning process? This smells like "blaming a lazy kid" as opposed to accepting that there may be a problem. Certainly it seems like an awful weird coincidence that the less effective teacher, as rated by the school, resulted in a child with less learning ability. It's also a weird coincidence that it was the same school they were at. I mean, a sample size of one is hard to make a definitive answer, but it seems awfully suspicious.

[madfloridian]

18. If you don't believe 3rd graders have a responsible role to play in their education...

then that is your right.

[joshcryer]

19. I don't think they should have to create their own homework.

Certainly they should do their own homework but if it's not provided by the teacher I don't think that's laziness.

[emsimon33]

22. The academic approach to kindergarten is harmful to children

If my child had a teacher who gave homework in kindergarten, I would seriously question the teacher's effectiveness.

[madfloridian]

17. I will bow to your superior knowledge of this issue.

No matter what I say, there's a negative response about it.

It's a losing battle when a thread deteriorates like this.

If this is how people want their public school teachers judged..and I assume it is....then I am wasting my breath.

[msanthrope]

20. The district judged her to be ineffective. And if she's ineffective, why

shouldn't this parent protest having their kid in her class?

Do you really expect parents to be okay with that?

[questionseverything]

27. it depends on the criteria used to judge her ineffective

if the criteria is bs test scores then you have no case

classes are often split by ability/grades...with twins most schools split the twins so one twin is going to end up in the lowest functioning class...if you are the teacher that teaches the low functioning class and are judged by test scores you are going to be judged "ineffective"

that is the catch 22 the nclb has created

the grandkids i am raising go to a "failing" school and yet their test scores are above the school districts average and the national averages.....the big difference is if one of my kids struggle with certain lessons i am involved enough to know it and tutor them,if that does not work i know to ask the teacher for help before they are lost on the next several lessons (every lesson builds from the last lesson)

my heart goes out to the imaginary single mom working two jobs that has no time to stay involved with their child's education but schools and teachers did not create that, 40 years of Reaganomics did

[July]

8. The books are normally ordered by the district, not by the teachers.

The ratings are a separate issue.

It's really not the teachers's "fault" or responsibility to provide the books.

[msanthrope]

9. Yes...it is when the books are there...and one teacher gets them and one doesn't

bother.

When you read the lawsuit, what did you dispute?

[madfloridian]

11. This is your thread now. You may respond as you wish.

[July]

13. I see no link to the lawsuit, so can't comment on that.

I do know where books normally come from ( not teachers, for starters).

[msanthrope]

14. This thread is about the lawsuit. This parent, who is a Plaintiff

in that lawsuit is commenting on how one of his twins got a teacher who was rated as ineffective by her own district. The OP did not mention that the district rated the teacher as such.

I agree...the OP should provide a link to the lawsuit. Mine is through Lexis.

[madfloridian]

15. I was accused of not providing a link, so I found one.

My OP was about the video and the words of the parent there. Those words count you know, esp when teachers' jobs are on the firing line.

There may be a better link. I am not that impressed with the reasons given in this lawsuit, but then I am just a retired teachers. Only celebrities, athletes, and parents know anything at all about education. On DU I am only a retired teacher and that counts for nothing now.

http://ny.chalkbeat.org/2014/07/27/campbell-browns-group-to-file-teacher-tenure-suit/#.U9b5tKi0bZQ

I was just reading a better format at a google links site, but it is not showing up in my history now.

[Mc Mike]

23. One teacher bought the books personally, the other didn't.

So that's means a de-facto pay cut for the 'good' teacher in this story. It's too bad that Campbell's deep pockets anonymous contributors don't get the teachers the textbooks, instead of attempting to eliminate union protections for the teaching profession. When you make teaching such an unattractive proposition for new employees, by making them pay over $100 k dollars for a degree, telling them they have no job protections or security, then telling them they have to buy the books themselves, you are driving away the most qualified people from considering teaching as a career.

Campbell says (~ min 2:45 in the vid) that teachers' seniority often winds up concentrating ineffective teachers, with longer time in the system, into the most disadvantaged schools in the district. Which is hogwash, an extremely gauzy explanation, or non-explanation, from her about the mechanics of the situation. System seniority means that teachers with more years in can apply for positions outside of the most disadvantaged schools in the area. There is nothing about system seniority that makes poorer schools have to take 'bad' teachers transferring from more affluent schools in the same district, as opposed to a 'bad' teacher with seniority using that seniority to leave the poorer area school. But that's what Brown's group is targeting, seniority. This won't solve the problem she acts like she wants solved, but it does exactly what the far right wants, guts unions and dismantles public education.

I notice that the interviewer said that people are attacking Brown. By asking her who her anonymous donors are, I guess. Her anonymous donors are running away from their bad track record, Koch bircher repugs who hate public education and Democratic Party-backing teachers' unions. They don't care about educating any non-rich American kid, in fact they want the Dept. of Ed abolished. The parent being interviewed is part of the re-branding effort, a paid worker for Rhee, whose job is to say that teachers' union protections are the problem, not the huge budgetary cuts and the unfunded NCLB mandate with its high stakes testing, not the huge drain of public ed tax dollars by well-connected for profit charters, not the social and economic problems created and reinforced by the far right in those poorer parts of the district.

I don't blame that man for looking out for his kids, but "I got mine" is just another way of saying "divide and conquer", and the rest of the kids in the district can't have parents who work for Brown, Rhee, Koch. That job's already taken.

[Starry Messenger]

24. +1

Wow, we are expected to buy the textbooks now? Why even have schools anymore?

[Mc Mike]

35. The Brown Senor Rhee Koch side is wrong on every count.

But mass media massaging of the issue makes their supremely implausible pretenses seem legit.

If I were a teacher, I'd really hate to have to purchase TX state-approved science or history texts with my own money, but teaching fundy Bircher creationism and Anglo-monoculture-'History' with those approved texts would seem to be the only way to get a 'good teacher' designation from Koch 'reformers'.

I think your second question really sums up the Koch agenda for American Public ed, Star.

[QC]

29. +2

[LWolf]

25. "Didn't bother to get them."

We don't have access to them. The district procures them and sends them to us. If the district is sending books to some schools and not others, the parents should be going after the district.

If two teachers are teaching different grade levels and/or subjects, one might receive books where the other didn't. Again, that's a district issue.

It's disingenuous to pretend that teachers are in charge of procuring books. We're not.

[dsc]

26. you might, just might, want to rewatch the video

the father says that the teacher who he liked BOUGHT THE BOOKS WITH HER OWN MONEY. It wasn't a case of a teacher not getting the books the district provided them but a case of a teacher not buying hundreds of dollars in text books with her own money.

[Rex]

31. Yeah well those kind of facts don't stick with the constant narrative of 'teachers bad'

or I should say 'public school teachers bad'...

[knitter4democracy]

21. The father makes it clear that the one teacher bought the books herself.

This isn't about going and getting them but that one teacher paid out of her own money and the other didn't (probably because she couldn't). The school is to provide textbooks, not the teachers.

[Rex]

32. *crickets*

nt.

[Smarmie Doofus]

28. Oh..... fertheloveachrist.

Can we just stop this idiocy NOW?

At what point does it become so blatantly obvious that school "reform" is yet another " financial sector" scam....... akin to Collateralized Debt Obligations... that we start taking education seriously?

Want to improve "teacher quality"? Read your own sacred tomes. Let the market place rule. 1. DOUBLE teachers' salaries and, 2. STRENGTHEN tenure.

That's right: *strengthen* it.

What kind of an idiot is going to go into a profession that is notoriously low-paid to begin with AND whose employment NOW will be completely subject to the whims , moods and machinations of whatever bureaucratic parasite the politicians decide to put in place to "supervise" them?

There is so much arrant bullshit attached to this topic. Are these same people still insisting that there are WMDs hidden in Iraq? Hmm.... maybe ISIS has been hiding 'em.

Food for thought.

If your thoughts don't customarily have much of an appetite.

This sounds like such a case.

K and R

[madfloridian]

30. In fact Keoni Wright is a paid organizer with Rhee's Student First.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10025362232

Campbell Brown’s plaintiffs include a healthy helping of conservative activists and paid employees of Brown’s partner organizations. Of the seven plaintiffs in Campbell Brown’s lawsuit, at least two are on the payroll of Michelle Rhee’s StudentsFirst. Keoni Wright, the lead plaintiff, is a paid organizer with StudentsFirst New York, as is Nina Doster.

Reformer groups working together, using their secret donations to harm public education......ain't it great??

[Rex]

33. Well some here MUST push the 'public teacher bad' meme for all it's worth.

Yet they ignore all the damage done by the wealthy trying to make a buck off kids and the heinous textbook companies that are only in education for the profit alone. No no...it is ALL the teachers fault, why you reply to these people mad...is beyond me. Their agenda is clearly anti-public education and all they want to do is shutdown your threads.

I have a kewl ignore system in place, works GREAT! I recommend you try it!

[madfloridian]

34. ......

Yes, you are right. I used to use ignore, but now I would rather see what they are saying. My thinking is others see it so I should also.

You are also right about responding.

[leftstreet]

36. DURec

[Octafish]

37. What do teachers know about education?

Hey, madfloridian! Remember when being a Democrat meant standing up for Unions?

[madfloridian]

38. Oh yeah I do.

There has not been even a hint of support for teachers or their unions since 2008. None.