As a DUES PAYING MEMBER of the NEA/IEA (Illinois Education Association) since 1999

[wndycty]

I ask other educators/DUers what should be done about failing schools, bad teachers?

While on the one hand I believe it is wrong and lazy to just fire every teacher at a failing school, I also know how hard it is to get rid of poor teachers. What should be done that is in the best interest of students but protects the job security of teachers who are living up to their obligation?

I'm not supporting the actions/rhetoric coming from the administration/Arne Duncan, but I also I'm not outraged either. I'm in a wait and see mode.

I am an adjunct instructor, who teaches marketing communication, at a local private college, so my perspective may admittedly be different than others. For a few semesters I also served in an administrative role (for someone on medical leave) and I had two teachers who were terrible, but I was unable to do anything about it, other than talk to the teachers who did not improve. Students constantly complained about how poor they were and we actually had two kids switch schools as a result. Right now, I do not serve in an administrative capacity but students still come to me with concerns and there is another teacher who has received a lot complaints.

I love the job security and compensation that my union provides me, however when I served in an administrative capacity I was discouraged by the lack options I had in dealing with poor teachers.

[leftofcool]

1. catch 22

There is no easy solution. As a retired teacher I agree with you. I have seen many pathetically bad teachers who could not be fired. On the other hand I have seen the unions step up to save a good teacher's job.

[mediaman007]

2. Don't you think its fair to have to build a case against a "bad" teacher?

Most unions protect the process, not the employee. I suspect that there is a process to remove a "bad" teacher. Shouldn't everyone have a process to protect them? I'm sure part of the process includes suspension if the situation warrants.

[wndycty]

3. True, however at the college level students have one semester with a given teacher. . .

. . .I have seen too many students make it past the the "dropp/add" period and they are stuck with a teacher who is not doing his or her job. The process is important and is needed to protect the teacher, however it really does screw over the student who is not learning anything.

I had one student who complained enough about a teacher that was so bad that she was able to get the school to let her take the class over for free. She passed with the bad teacher, but she felt she didn't learn ANYTHING. On the one hand its great the school gave her a re-take for free, but then she had to spend another 15 weeks in a class she already passed just so she could actually feel she got her money's worth.

[mediaman007]

7. Is this a tenured instructor?

[wndycty]

12. No, but once you become a union member . . .

. . . and seniority kicks in its hard to remove a teacher. I do have to check to see if there is a probationary period. The teachers that were problems when I was serving in an administrative role both had seniority.

I have a lot of seniority so I have job security and the right of first refusal on the classes I teach. If one of my classes get canceled I would actually be entitled to take the class of someone with less seniority

[kiva]

21. I also teach at a community college, and one of the things

I've been warned repeatedly about are students who file complaints in an attempt to get a refund for classes they are failing. I thought the issue was being exaggerated until it happened to me; it took three months to clear the complaint (and my reputation) even though the investigating office told me this student had done this before and they were sure he was lying. I had a student who plagiarized two papers complain to my department chair because she flunked the class and wanted her money back.

If you've been in administration you should know the procedure for terminating non-tenured faculty is not particularly onerous - for adjuncts it simply involves not hiring them back next semester, for tenure track faculty it's slightly more convoluted, but certainly not impossible.

[wndycty]

22. Its not that easy when they are members of the union. . .

. . .also in this case the teachers in question received numerous complaints from numerous students so this is not about students trying to get refunds for classes they are failing.

[kiva]

23. That's good for the adjuncts. Here they have absolutly no

protection - the faculty member in charge of scheduling adjuncts decides who works and how many classes they teach; when the faculty member in charge of this changes (about every 3 years) they have no requirement to consider previous schedules and there is no concept of seniority. Not surprisingly adjuncts do not like this system, but they don't have any power to change it.

[frazzled]

4. One thing I think we need to make clear

if we tie your statements to the kerfuffle about Central Falls High School: those teachers were not fired because they were "bad" teachers. It was a labor dispute about compensation for revised duties. At least 50% of those teachers will be immediately rehired under a new contract that contains the new duties. I just don't want to confuse issues by making the assumption that the teachers were fired for poor performance. Because that really doesn't reflect the facts precisely.

Now, what you say is very honest and thought provoking. There's an inherent tension between the positive benefits of union-provided job security and wage standards and administration-required need to oversee hiring and quality issues. More flexibility has to be found on both sides.

I look back on the ancient history of my own education and I can point to teachers who were beyond excellent and teachers who should have been run out of town.

Mrs. Elliott, my 2nd grade teacher, I will always be grateful to you. I recall how you let a group of us advanced readers have a little daily circle to discuss those little blue biographies of famous Americans you gave us: Abigail Adams and Thomas Jefferson. I was so inspired. And I remember the lengths to which you went to help us make papier mache models of the planets in the solar system and suspend them from the classroom ceiling in exact proportion. I especially remember how I returned from college one summer and the phone rang, and it was you! Asking after all those years how and what I was doing. You were a credit to your profession. You treated every student with dignity and had high expectations for each of us. You challenged us and made learning interesting.

Mr. Greenway, I'm talking to you, too. I remember the hell that you made of fourth grade for us. We did nothing--absolutely nothing--all year. I was aware of this even at that young age. The only thing you had us do, day in and day out, was to fill out page after page of cursive writing exercises. And if we neglected to completely close the final stroke of a single letter "a," you handed us more sheets of paper and we had to write a thousand more letter "a"s. I was a quiet, studious girl, but one day another student asked me something and I whispered back. You made me stay after school and write on the blackboard 500 times "I will keep my big mouth shut." I hated you, and I learned nothing from you. You should have been fired.

Most of my teachers were competent but somewhat forgettable to me. It was the very good ones and the very bad ones I recall. The excellent ones should be called upon to mentor and share teaching strategies with their peers, and I believe we should find a way to honor their achievement with extra compensation. The really egregiously bad ones should be considered for dismissal. How could this be done? I think hearings before a panel of teachers that took into account parent and student complaints, and observations (perhaps anonymous?) from peers could accomplish the goal. I'd have to think that through.

[izzybeans]

5. Definitely a tough question.

It's in no one's interest to keep a bad teacher. Though I think the "bad teacher" meme is used to stereotype the entire profession, it is still important to deal with them fairly. Are they getting enough instructional support from leaders? Proper professional development? Is their performance based on peer and instructional leader evaluations? etc.

If the answer to these questions and similar one's is yes, I'd think the unions would have a clear process in place to reassign or terminate an employee who is not serving their students well. This is more fair and just than the Rhode Island solution and Arne's turnaround school plans. In Chicago, it is hard to fire a teacher, and the reasons why are definitely valid (e.g. protecting professional autonomy and tenure), but as a poster said above-a process must exist that is fair for not just the teacher, but also the student and school they serve. Without that process schools are going to be easy prey for "turnaround". Whatever it is currently (in chicago) is dysfunctional and it lent support for Duncans turnaround school plan ("if I can't fire them, I'll just close the school and reopen it"). If a process was in place to say "hey these 25 teachers are top notch, nationally certified, consistently effective" and these 3 are chronically late, have performed poorly under classroom observation, etc." then turning a school around like Arne likes to do would be politically impossible.

It would make sense to come in and evaluate (even if an outside evaluator is necessary) the instructional staff and administration of a poorly performing school and give praise to those that deserve it and reassign or fire as appropriate, but to go nuclear on a public school goes far beyond rational accountability. I can think of few other professions that face this option under such a powerful political microscope.

All this being said, in relation to the Rhode Island situation, it is not hard at all to drill down on test scores to discover that there are factors other than the classroom that have a direct impact on student performance. And any analyst worth their salt could pin-point classroom by classroom trends that control for these factors in order to estimate the "teacher effect" (e.g. drop-out rates tend to cluster geographically in densely populated low-income census tracts, thus have a structural cause, and the "teacher effect" would be minimal). None of this should replace the peer led performance evaluation process in the classroom, however I'd predict that it would go a long way towards showing how intellectually lazy relying on test scores as a proxy for teacher performance truly is.

[Catshrink]

18. Great post!

Thank you!

[LiberalFighter]

6. Review board in cases of teachers needing to be released or provide addtional training.

Review boards should consist of members from the administrative, education and union. A 3/5 vote required before a teacher could be subject to termination. (at least 60% of the review board)

Anyone appointed or elected to represent the education (teachers) should be someone who is at or near the top of their profession. Administrative could also appoint someone from the education side if they wanted. The review board could have the education part of the review board different based on the area of expertise of the teacher under review. If a teacher is in the English Dept then there should be at least one from that dept on the review board. Anyone from the administrative slots should have at least one from the school involving the teacher.

There should also be some steps involved that include improving the teacher's skills before any attempt is made to terminate a teacher.

I don't know if schools provide any type of workshops. If they don't they should. Some should be based on the class they teach and others should be basic.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

8. If only 7% of my students were proficient, I'd have resigned myself.

[Nicholas D Wolfwood]

10. I hear that a lot.

But unfortunately, that doesn't seem to happen when the rubber actually hits the road. Not that I blame them - everyone's got a mortgage.

[Nicholas D Wolfwood]

9. Here's the problem.

The only way we can even have this conversation is doing it the way you did - by stating in big bold letters that you're a dues paying union teacher. And yet there is literally nothing in the body of your post that differs from that which any reform minded Democrat - including Arne Duncan - has said on the issue. I'm a reform minded Democrat - I certainly don't want to fire teachers willy-nilly. I have no vendetta against teachers - my wife is one. But at the same time, the mechanism for moving bad teachers out of the system is entirely flawed at this point.

At some point, we need to get beyond the histrionics of "us versus them" and actually discuss the issue the way we're obviously capable of doing so here.

[mopinko]

11. let's be fair. in chicago, although all the teachers were "fired", 50% could be

and often were rehired. the good ones stayed.

wndy, i would love to have some info on how things are working out for the schools in chicago that were reconstituted. not all were turned into charters. and even so, in chicago, not all charter teachers are non-union.
there was a lengthy process that led up to these measures, here, and only after they failed were the schools "turned around". people had plenty of chances, and resources before the hammer dropped.
and btw, this was not a policy that arne duncan came up with. it was in place when he arrived, and was begun at the behest of the team that took over when daley took control of the schools.

[Enrique]

13. any word on how Collins High is doing?

There was a lot of attention up to the closing, but I can't find anything since then.

Has anyone followed up on how the students are doing since the closing?

have you seen these videos?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JTbqr6-ry3A

[Jakes Progress]

14. Big fallacy.

It is not hard to get rid of a bad teacher. The process in the several states where I have experience is quite straightforward. The problem is that you have to have an administrator who actually knows what decent teaching looks like and how to discuss it with the teacher in question. I have had a hand in "getting rid" of bad teachers. Not one push back from following prescribed procedures. Lazy administrators who lack an understanding of how children learn and how teachers promote that process try firing en masse or resort to trying to "run the off" with bad assignments. The usual tactic is to get them to transfer. In actual practice, the usual outcome is that the teacher improves and becomes a better educator and doesn't have to leave. This occurs many more times than the teacher must be fired.

Basing a teacher's performance or the performance of a building full of teachers on scratch and pass test scores is a sure sign that the administration has no concept of what would be good education. Even if they get rid of the targeted teachers, they will have no idea what they want to replace those teachers with that will do better.

[proud2BlibKansan]

24. +1

Very true.

The administrators get bogged down in the process and don't seem to be able to follow the directions. It's insane. They play paperwork games with us all the time. Just the other day I got yelled at for turning my payroll sheet in to the wrong person. Our lesson plans have to be just so or we get written up. But when it comes to principals filing paperwork and meeting deadlines (neither of which are very complicated) they fail. Every damn time.

This is one of the main reasons I oppose merit pay. The same idiots who can't figure out how to fire bad teachers are going to decide how much I earn? No thanks.

[damonm]

15. Oh, dear - a reasoned question. There's no place for that on DU!

I'll have to unrec at once...
(do I really need to say...)
:sarcasm:

[ncteechur]

16. Here here. Thanks for your reasoned response. I agree with your assessment.

[mr715]

17. As a DUES PAYING MEMBER of the UFT/AFT

I'm a teacher at an inner city, high poverty middle school in NYC.

Teachers that are uninterested in student performance or growth need to be disciplined. They produce a product in the form of student education and academic growth. If teachers make an effort but are prevented from being successful by mitigating factors, well, thats what the union is for...

But teachers that are tenured and comfortable in seniority at the expense of our students need to be suspended or removed.

Reinstate them after they enroll in professional development.

[JVS]

19. If you want better teachers, start hiring better teachers by offering more money.

Nothing is free, and quality teachers are no exception to that. If a 22 year old out of college could earn $100,000/ year by teaching, then the education major would be filled with competitive and motivated students of whom schools could take their pick.

[mr715]

20. Also

Make it academically rigorous.

I went through an education program (as part of alternative certification) and it was laughable. There were no professors, only instructors with masters degrees or lower, with no publications, nor any training in adult education.

The other professional schools, such as law, medicine, social work, architecture, etc. all have objective goals and performance indicators. Education schools are mills to certify teachers because there is turnover.

Pay teachers $150,000. Eliminate automatic tenure. Give teachers authority to discipline students with suspension for frequent, documented disruption. Force education schools to improve standards or face loss of accreditation. Make sure all schools offer a recess period and physical education.

Obviously, not possible. But fixes a lot of problems. Humbly, as always...


MR

[Hippo_Tron]

25. That's about as politically realistic as single payer

We are a society that doesn't value education.

[mr715]

29. I started at $63k.

Some charter schools in NYC start at the low 80s if you agree to surrender tenure.



MR

[4_TN_TITANS]

26. "I'm in a wait and see mode"

I don't have the perfect solution, but this has been the reaction in general from the NEA since the 2008 election - while the destruction of public education spirals exponentially. Starting with the unfunded NCLB mandates and self-devouring competition of public schools, now we have the unfunded budgets coming home to roost because of the economy. If the sleeping giant of teacher unions doesn't wake up soon, what happened in RI will be happening everywhere (that it hasn't already happened).

Plans to drown public education in the bathtub are going splendidly.

(wife was a TN NEA delegate, and current member)

[cornermouse]

27. As a parent whose children's school years add up to

36 years not counting college, I have to point out that my kids only ran into 1 teacher who probably shouldn't have been a teacher. I'm sorry but I don't agree with your OP at all.

[senseandsensibility]

28. Thank you cornermouse

and as a career teacher with more than twenty five years experience, I, too, have only ran into a tiny number of teachers that should be fired. In all these years, and as a teacher in three different districts and twelve different schools, I have only seen two that I think were incompetent. One of these had health issues which interfered with her job performance. The problem is extremely overblown in the media. But FAUX and other right wing propagandists have convinced even good progressives that the problem of "bad" teachers is epidemic.

[goclark]

30. I too was a school administrator for many years

I very much support the Teacher's Union but in some cases, we as educators need to really look in the mirror and see how we can be even better.

I am 100% in favor of Public Schools providing quality education.