September 3, 2009
The Teaching Diverse Students Initiative Teaching Tolerance has just launched a new online initiative to help you improve the quality of instruction experienced by racially and ethnically diverse students. Take a look at the tools we have to offer. Reaching Students Where They AreCulturally Relevant Teaching: Beyond the Basics
In Teaching Tolerance MagazineSee our new approach to Mix It Up at Lunch Day - and get on the map before Nov. 10, 2009! No time for traditional parent-teacher meetings? Grassroots organizing gets marginalized parents involved.Students with learning disabilities tell their stories.
¡Sí, se puede!Yes, you can order our teaching kit, Viva La Causa, for FREE.
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We welcome your feedback.You can reach us onlineor by mail:Teaching Tolerancec/o Southern Poverty Law Center400 Washington Ave.Montgomery, AL 36104
Sunday, September 13, 2009
Wednesday, September 2, 2009
Charter School Invaision
There has been a lot going on this summer regarding charter schools. They are schools that are paid for with public money but according to the NY State Charter School Act of 1998, they are exempt from most "state and local laws, rules, regulations or policies governing public or private schools, boards of education and school districts.." Currently there are 82 charter schools in NYC, many in Brooklyn. Eighteen more have been approved to open this fall. By privatizing and outsoucing public education, charter schools are dividing communities in New York City and around the country. Access to a high quality public education is not something that should be won in a lottery- it is a basic human and civil right that all children deserve.
The 4.3 billion "Race To the Top" Fund recently outlined by the Obama administration will further expand this privatization of our schools. Following is an article written by Diane Ravitch which paints a clear picture of these issues.
Diane Ravitch, Historian of education, NYU and Brookings:
Someday when the history of the Obama administration is written, perhaps we will then understand why this President, who came to Washington as an agent of change, so fully embraced Republican ideas about education.Because of the economic crisis, the administration won a staggering amount of money--$100 billion-- to help the nation's schools weather the downturn in tax revenues. Most of that money went to the schools, as was intended. But $4.3 Billion was set aside for "innovation" and "reform."This unprecedented amount of discretionary money has been deemed the "Race to the Top" fund. The Secretary of Education has issued regulations that set forth specific criteria that states must comply with if they expect to win a share of the prize. They must remove any legal restrictions on the number of charter schools in their states. And they must remove any laws that prevent the state from connecting teacher evaluations to student test scores.This agenda is not evidence-based. It is a reflection of the GOP agenda of choice and accountability. There is no evidence that charter schools are unfailingly better than regular public schools, and there is no evidence that schools get better if teacher evaluations are based on student test scores.
In my forthcoming book (The Death and Life of the Great American School System), I show the origins of these ideas. They are an attempt to impose privatization on the schools and to use inappropriate business techniques in judging teachers.What we do know from research and experience is that charter schools vary wildly in quality, from excellent to awful, and that on average they are not superior to regular public schools. We also know from research on teacher effectiveness that a teacher whose classes get high test scores one year may not get them the next year, because of variations among the students in the classes.In short, the administration is on the wrong track. It is now imposing "solutions" that will solve nothing. And sadly a huge amount of money intended to help and support our schools will enrich edu-entrepreneurs and do little or nothing to help our schools and our children.----------------------------------Obama's Awful Education PlanBy Diane RavitchPosted: August 23, 2009 10:22 AM
The 4.3 billion "Race To the Top" Fund recently outlined by the Obama administration will further expand this privatization of our schools. Following is an article written by Diane Ravitch which paints a clear picture of these issues.
Diane Ravitch, Historian of education, NYU and Brookings:
Someday when the history of the Obama administration is written, perhaps we will then understand why this President, who came to Washington as an agent of change, so fully embraced Republican ideas about education.Because of the economic crisis, the administration won a staggering amount of money--$100 billion-- to help the nation's schools weather the downturn in tax revenues. Most of that money went to the schools, as was intended. But $4.3 Billion was set aside for "innovation" and "reform."This unprecedented amount of discretionary money has been deemed the "Race to the Top" fund. The Secretary of Education has issued regulations that set forth specific criteria that states must comply with if they expect to win a share of the prize. They must remove any legal restrictions on the number of charter schools in their states. And they must remove any laws that prevent the state from connecting teacher evaluations to student test scores.This agenda is not evidence-based. It is a reflection of the GOP agenda of choice and accountability. There is no evidence that charter schools are unfailingly better than regular public schools, and there is no evidence that schools get better if teacher evaluations are based on student test scores.
In my forthcoming book (The Death and Life of the Great American School System), I show the origins of these ideas. They are an attempt to impose privatization on the schools and to use inappropriate business techniques in judging teachers.What we do know from research and experience is that charter schools vary wildly in quality, from excellent to awful, and that on average they are not superior to regular public schools. We also know from research on teacher effectiveness that a teacher whose classes get high test scores one year may not get them the next year, because of variations among the students in the classes.In short, the administration is on the wrong track. It is now imposing "solutions" that will solve nothing. And sadly a huge amount of money intended to help and support our schools will enrich edu-entrepreneurs and do little or nothing to help our schools and our children.----------------------------------Obama's Awful Education PlanBy Diane RavitchPosted: August 23, 2009 10:22 AM
Let's think of some more ways to evaluate teachers!
The DOE has teamed up with the Gates Foundatin to create a new way to evaluate teachers and they are asking for volunteers to participate in this experiment. The UFT is also involved. I'm not sure yet what I think about this but there is some compensation involved, in case anyone is interested. Here's a link to the article in the New York Times followed by the letter sent out by the DOE and the UFT.
How Should Teachers be Evaluated?
September 1, 2009
Dear Colleagues,
The United Federation of Teachers (UFT) and the Department of Education (DOE) are looking for volunteers to participate in a Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation study to help develop fair, accurate, and useful guides to what really makes effective teaching and learning. This two-year research study is premised on the principle that good teaching is multi-dimensional, and that teachers and their schools need consistent and reliable information in order to identify and support good teaching.
Both the United Federation of Teachers and the Department of Education will be collaborating with independent researchers on this project because we all recognize that the work of teachers must be measured in ways that are fair and valid. Nationally, current measures of teaching rarely take into account the full range of what teachers do (no single measure really can), or the context in which they teach. The Measures of Effective Teaching project, on the other hand, begins right in the classroom and will explore a broad array of teacher measures: video observations, surveys, and student growth. It will compare these measures to each other, and to nationally recognized standards, and it will look at their inter-relatedness. It will be informed by actual teacher practice.
In other words, the real work of real teachers in real classrooms will be central to every aspect of this project. That’s why both the UFT and the DOE have looked forward to working with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation: we want to support student achievement with solid research based on what our teachers do in class.
To that end, together, we are inviting eligible teachers to join us in this project. Participation is completely voluntary, and those teachers who volunteer will be allowing Gates-funded researchers to collect information about their teaching from a broad variety of sources in order to answer two basic questions: what is our common understanding of the teaching and learning process, and how do we measure it consistently? To answer these questions, researchers will video classrooms; collect surveys from participating teachers and students; assess teacher knowledge of content and pedagogy through a brief test; and collect information on student academic growth through specially administered standardized tests. Researchers will look at the videos through the lens of several different sets of nationally recognized teaching standards to see which work best. And, teachers will also provide their own reflections on the lessons that have been videotaped.
As you can see, Gates hopes to capture the full range of what teachers do by gathering multiple sources of information, including information on the context in which the teachers teach. The goal is to use this information to create multiple, reliable measures of good teaching.
And that is important to all of us. We all know that teachers teach best when they know what the standards are for their teaching, have been supported in reaching those standards, and feel assured that no single, snapshot measure will determine the course of their career. If you volunteer, you will be joining us in a project that will help us understand what works when it comes to assessing teachers. We hope this will lead to fairer guides for all of us, and raise the level of achievement in our schools.
To acknowledge their contribution over the course of the two years, teachers will receive a $1,500 stipend. And of course, they will also have access to their own videos as well as student test results.
Finally, let us say clearly at the outset: this is a research project, and it assures full confidentiality to the teachers who volunteer. That means that principals and other DOE employees will not receive copies of your videos, surveys, or assessments. And, teachers will be able to opt out of the program at any time. This project is not about the evaluation of the 1,000 teachers we hope will join us, and it cannot be used by the DOE to evaluate them; rather it is about evaluating the multiple evaluation measures that are used across the country in order to ensure that they are fair, transparent, and consistent. Schools need a better understanding of these measures. To that end, the researchers do hope to share aggregated data with the central DOE and the union, which could prove helpful in supporting teachers.
Schools and teachers will have opportunities to learn more about this study in the coming weeks through borough meetings and other communications. More information, including important details about which schools and teachers are eligible and the requirements of the study, can be found at the DOE Web site.
We hope you will join us in this project; it may turn out to be among the most meaningful projects of your career. And, thank you, as always, for your work on behalf of our students.
Sincerely,
Joel I. Klein
Michael Mulgrew
Chancellor
UFT President
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