“When Will I Get the Look?” The Quest for Excellence in the Classroom.

 

On the first day of school the early childhood grades, the five, six and seven years old were squirming in their seats as Ms. Goodman walked to the stage. She stood erect, glaring at the audience … the tykes whispered “It’s Mrs. Goodman,” and sat up straight, the six and seven year olds shush-shing the five year olds. You could hear a pin drop.

 

A new teacher, standing in the back of the auditorium, asked her colleague, “When will I get ‘the look?’” 

 

For some, it will some slowly but surely come with experience, unfortunately, for others, never. I have met new teachers with sparkling resumes from elite colleges, who have never failed at anything, and were devoured by six year olds; high school teachers with years of experience teaching high level math classes brought to their knees by middle schoolers.

 

One October I met a gray bearded Teaching Fellow, two months into his teaching career, he had been the Chief Financial Officer of a major corporation who retired to fulfill his lifetime ambition, to be a teacher. “This is the hardest job I’ve ever had … my emotions flit from elation to despair, in the same period, and I drag myself home every day …teaching is a Herculean task.”

 

On Tuesday a million children will begin another year of school. Teachers will be standing at the classroom door, welcoming the youngsters, eager to begin that magical task, teaching children to read, to think, to express, to become successful young adults.

 

Earlier in the week the 2007 high school graduation numbers were released, and, the Department of Education, lauded the increases. 

 

What is so troubling is that from the State down to the classroom we are incrementally easing the requirements. We know this from the NAEP scores. The diploma, the graduation document, has been made easier. The State, the City, schools and yes, teachers, cannot pat themselves on the back.

 

This is a terrible disservice to the children we teach.

 

I have heard too many teachers lament, the work is “too hard” for the children we teach. Children living in poverty, with health issues, in crime ridden neighborhoods, in single parent households, … let’s not teach Regents classes in the 9th grade, let’s use 3rd grade readers in the 4th grade … after all, these kids face such obstacles …

 

We can’t succumb. We have to all get that “look.” We must demand, from ourselves and the children we teach.

 

Students must graduate from high schools with the skills that will enable them to compete: to compete in college and the workplace.

 

Teachers must not bemoan the lives of the children they teach: teachers can control their own conduct, they control the lessons they teach. As teachers, as communities of teachers and learners, we must acquire the skills, the “look,” to become the best at what we do …

The Pope’s Divisions: Why Teachers and Their Unions Must Be At the Core of An Obama Victory.

 

The Democratic Convention, and the “real” campaign kicked off Monday night. Kausfiles, on Slate attended a pre-convention event hosted by, among others, the Klein-Sharpton Education Equity Project folk. Cory Booker, the Mayor of Newark, Adrian Fenty, the Mayor of Washington DC, Michelle Rhee, Joel and their buds all attacked teacher unions, and, urged Obama to support their agenda.

 

Perhaps it is time to remember the words of the most famous Georgian of all, Josef Vassarionovich Djugashvili (aka Stalin)

 

 When an advisor warned him against conflict with the Catholic Church, Stalin contemptuously demanded, “How many divisions does the pope have?”

 

According to the Census Bureau, in 2005 there were 6.5 million teachers (including librarians and teacher assistants). The National Education Association (NEA) has 3.2 million members and the American Federation of Teachers (AFT) 1.6 million members – 4.8 million members, living and voting in each and every election district across the length and breath of the nation.

 

Teachers are involved! They vote at rates much higher than other Americans, they spent endless hours working for Clinton and Obama … dedicated, caring, and willing to make phone calls, knock on doors, willing to spend the endless hours doing the grunge work that elects candidates.

 

They are the fabric of America, your neighbors, the teachers of America’s children, and, Americans don’t like their teachers besmirched.

 

From the northern slopes of Alaska to Key West, from Boston to San Diego, teachers, who read about the issues, and express themselves, who convince spouses and children and friends and neighbors.

 

If Obama and the democrats are going to win, teachers must be at the core of the campaign, the proverbial “feet on the ground.”

 

Teachers and their unions are the “divisions,” Klein and his ilk, who have no respect for teachers and revile their democratically elected unions, are “empty” voices.

Putin, Wen Jiaboa, Nazarbayev and Mike Bloomberg (“It’s Good to be King”): In Our Democracy Mayors, Legislators, Parents and Teachers Are Equal Partners …

 

Teachers return to school on August 28th and the kids the following week, the major issue confronting the Department is the very existence of the Department as currently organized.

 

Buddy Cianci, the former Mayor of Providence, one time guest of the feds and currently a talk show host is credited with warning, “beware, the hand you bite today may be attached to the ass you have to kiss tomorrow.”

 

The Mayor of New York is as close as you can come to a warlord, hopefully, a benevolent warlord. The City Charter revision in the 80’s emasculated the City Council and the Borough Presidents. The Borough Presidents have no legislative authority, in fact, aside from being cheer leaders for their boroughs, no role whatsoever. The City Council gets to name streets, pass laws prohibiting blowing air conditioning into streets, and, oh yes, dispensing several millions to organizations in their communities.

 

The few times the Mayor had to deal with the New York State legislature: the West Side stadium and congestion pricing,  he fumbled badly. 

 

The law that handed over the Board of Education to the Mayor has a sunset provision: the law “ends” on June 30, 2009, and, if the law is not extended, reauthorized or amended, it reverts to the previous law: the old Board of Education.

 

Mike is the modern day warlord: he rules over New York, ignores, or punishes his detractors, and basks in the adulation of his subjects.

 

In an article in the New York Sun Elizabeth Green interviewed members of the New York State legislature who all sharply question the efficacy of the current law.

 

 State Senator Martin Malave Dilan, a Democrat of Brooklyn, described trying to contact the Department of Education’s government liaison office to discuss a problem in a school. “The response I got was, ‘Well the principal of the school is his own CEO. So if the principal couldn’t help you, no one else can.’”Lawmakers said they are not trying to buy influence or favors, but rather trying to help improve the schools.

“If his definition of politics in the schools are special interest favors, then none of us want politics in the schools. But do we want good information? Yes. Do we want planning? Yes,” State Senator Liz Krueger of Manhattan said.

Assemblywoman Audrey Pheffer, a Queens Democrat, asked the same question. “What kind of politics is he trying to take out of the schools?” she said. “Is it when maybe a politician calls and says, ‘Gee, I’d love this kid in this class.’ Is that what he’s talking about? Or is it when I call and say, ‘Gee, what are you doing with the extra billions of dollars that I gave you?’”

Assemblyman Alan Maisel of Brooklyn said he does not want to scrap mayoral control; he wants to improve it by implementing checks and balances that would allow more community participation. “Everybody complains about three men in a room. So what do you think about one man in a room?” Mr. Maisel said. “That’s basically what happens: The chancellor makes the decisions and everybody has to live with it.”

The Mayor, however, has no interest in modifying the law. 

 

“You can’t run something this big without having one person have accountability,” Mr. Bloomberg said of the school system. “That’s what the Legislature gave us, and hopefully come next June, they will reapprove and make permanent the change. And if they try to water it down, they might as well just take it away. Either you have accountability or you don’t.”

 

The founding documents of our nation, the Declaration of Independence, the Federalist Papers, the Constitution, the politics and fears of the 1790’s and the climatic election of 1800 were all concerned with balancing the power of the executive with the rights of the public.

 

In the 1790’s the public selected electors, either on a statewide or district by district basis. There was a lack of trust, after all the masses might not make the proper decision. In the rough and tumble election of 1800, wonderfully described by Edward Larson in his Magnificent Catastrophe,  Jefferson and the Republicans prevailed over Adams and the Federalists.

 

Bloomberg, in the tradition of the Federalists, and, increasingly resembling the autocrats around the world, has no confidence in the people, yes, those very people that Bloomberg swore to serve.

 

Perhaps the  Mayor should take some time to read James Madison in Federalist, # 51:

 

 Ambition must be made to counteract ambition. The interest of the man must be connected with the constitutional rights of the place. It may be a reflection on human nature, that such devices should be necessary to control the abuses of government. But what is government itself, but the greatest of all reflections on human nature? If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself.

 

Why Are We Failing English Language Learners? The Children of Immigrants Deserve to Be At the Top of Department Agenda, Not Ignored.

 

“betraying a whole generation of immigrant kids who are struggling to succeed”

 

The New York State Education Department, pointing out the “pluses” and “minuses,” released the High School Graduation data from the 2003 cohort (students graduating in June/August 2007). The SED reports that 25.2 % of ELL students enrolling in 2003 graduated, 29.4% dropped out, and 40% are still enrolled. The percentage of ELL students who are graduating is declining.

 

The percentage of ELL students graduating declined by 5% between the 2001 and 2003 cohorts.

 

The NYC Department of Education, in a gloating power point, report a rise in the graduation rate for ELL students.

 

The graduation rate among English Language Learners rose 3.1 points to 23.5 in 2007, after falling from 26.5 percent in 2005 to 20.4 percent in 2006.

 

The disparity in the State and the City numbers is distressing, especially since 76% of ELL students are in New York City.

 

The Immigrant Coalition slammed the low ELL graduation rates in an article in Gotham Gazette.

 

Who are English Language Learners (ELL)? 

 

* The U.S. Department of Education defines the term limited English proficient child as an individual

(A) who is aged 3 through 21;

(B) who is enrolled or preparing to enroll in an elementary school or secondary school;

(C) (i) who was not born in the United States or whose native language is a language other than English; (ii) (I) who is a Native American or Alaska Native, or a native resident of the outlying areas; and (II) who comes from an environment where a language other than English has had a significant impact on the individual’s level of English language proficiency; or (iii) who is migratory, whose native language is a language other than English, and who comes from an environment where a language other than English is dominant; and

(D) whose difficulties in speaking, reading, writing, or understanding the English language may be sufficient to deny the individual– (i) the ability to meet the state’s proficient level of achievement on state assessments described in section 1111(b)(3); (ii) the ability to successfully achieve in classrooms where the language of instruction is English; or (iii) the opportunity to participate fully in society.

Source: Federal PL 107-110, The No Child Left Behind Act of 2001, Title IX, General Provisions, Part A Definitions, Section 9101(25)

Looking at the same data the City applauds themselves while the State sees serious inequities.

An acquaintance was visiting the City for the first time in over a decade; staying in, believe it or not, a bed and breakfast in Brooklyn. She strolled through a South Asian neighborhood along Coney Island Avenue to an Orthodox Jewish neighborhood along Avenue J to a Caribbean neighborhood through a Chinese neighborhood. Ethnic diversity is at the core of this wonderful City. Families from around the world, hardworking, conscientious, seeking what is best for their children; repeating the experiences of our ancestors who fled the bigotry and poverty of the old world.

What is so troubling is that we know what works. For example, the International High Schools, a network of nine public high schools serving 2700 ELL students around the City, has an outstanding record of serving the immigrant community.

Under the current organization principals are measured solely by the Progress Report grade, and, unfortunately, too many schools have no idea how to provide appropriate instruction for ELL students. No one monitors anything, and pushing aside ELL kids is not uncommon.

The 140,000 (13.4%) ELL students in the NYC school system are entitled to the best  instruction and this administration has been a failure.

Graduating to Oblivion: In the Knowledge Economy Basic High School Graduation Reguirements Are Inadequate, “Bling” versus Physics

 

 ‘After all, facts are facts, and although we may quote one to another with a chuckle the words of the Wise Statesman, “Lies – damn lies – and statistics,” still there are some easy figures the simplest must understand, and the astutest cannot wriggle out of.’

Leonard Henry Courtney (1832-1918)

 

One of the measures of school success, or failure, are high school graduation rates. The problem: States set their own graduation requirements and their own methodology to determine graduation rates. The National Governors Association is attempting to gain agreement that States will use a uniform definition of graduation rates.

 

In a Report entitled,  Implementing Graduation Counts: State Progress to Date 2008 the Association writes:

In 2005, governors of all 50 states signed the NGA Graduation Counts Compact to implement voluntarily a common formula for calculating their state’s high school graduation rate. The NGA Compact contained four key commitments:

• to use a common, four-year adjusted cohort graduation rate formula;
• to build state data collection and reporting capacity;
• to develop additional student outcome indicators; and
• to report annually on their progress toward meeting these commitments.

By 2012 the NSA predicts that all States will have completed their commitments.

 

The NYS Education Department has just released preliminary data on the 2003 graduation cohort. The major newspapers all reported on the release of the data, the NY Times, the NY Post and the NY Sun, all report the “up tick” in graduations. Rates have increased all over the State, the increase in New York City is at a faster rate, however, minority students and students with disabilities lag badly.

 

The DOE press conference, with power point and big screen has become the standard operating procedure. Understand that the DOE held a press conference to claim credit for the rising of the sun … Diane Ravitch and Sol Stern reminded Tweed that the sun has been rising for billions of millennia, Tweed communications director Cantor, responding, “While this may be so it does not reduce the role of the Children First Initiative.”

 

Elizabeth Green, in the NY Sun, writes:

 

An education professor at Brooklyn College, David Bloomfield, said the gains in graduation rates may be artificially inflated by principals trying to raise their figures, which are tied to prizes such as higher report card grades and salary bonuses.

Mr. Bloomfield named two practices that he called “gimmicks”: local diplomas, which are being phased out by the state but now allow students to graduate with lower scores on Regents exams, and credit recovery programs, which allow students to earn credits from classes they failed by completing last-minute makeup work.

The state’s education commissioner, Richard Mills, yesterday said he and Mr. Klein are instructing their staffs to study the credit recovery system after holding a meeting to discuss it last week.

From my perspective I proffer three reasons for the increase:

* Better Technology: You must give credit to this administration for the ease in accessing student data. Every school, with a few mouse clicks, can view cohort data as well as records for each and every student. The cohort “rules” are complex and require management by a school, i.e., kids entering during the school year may, or, may not have been in the NYC school system … did the bureaucrats enter the data correctly? is the kid in the “correct” cohort? Are kids who leave schools “good” discharges (to another school) or  “bad” discharges (dropouts)? Schools can now track all this datum on a granular, student by student level.

* Guidance Counselor/Student Ratios: Many of the small high schools have manageable GC/Student ratios … instead of 300 to 400 students per counselor it is not uncommon to have 100-200 ratios. The counselor is the key person – constant contact with students, ability to motivate, to seek the right placements, development those surrogate parent relationships that are so vital to our kids.

* Credit Recovery: Under, I can only whisper the words, the Board of Education, each high school was required to maintain a Course Accreditation Committee, including the UFT Chapter Leader; all “new” courses had to be approved by the Committee, and memorialized in the Superintendent’s office. For example a school might have a two-day camping trip to make up for a phys ed credit. In the regency of Tweed Credit Recovery is totally unsupervised, in fact, there are absolutely no records. If a student earns a Credit Recovery credit the school reverses the failing grade … there is no indication on the record how the credit was earned. In some instances, like the Hallway Project students have met the seat time requirement but failed the course, complete a teacher supervised, standards based project, a responsible approach.  In others credits are freely distributed in a blatant, disgraceful manner, with a “wink and a nod” from Tweed.

Yes, an increasing graduation rate should be applauded, but, the local diploma, a grade of 55 on four of the five required Regents exams, is bare literacy. Even the Regents diploma, passing five Regents exams with grades of 65 or better is barely proficient. The CUNY College Readiness Rubric is the equivalent of the advanced diploma – eight Regents exams, with at least one advanced math class. How many kids graduate with an advanced diploma? Three or four percent?

In spite of the yeoman efforts of teachers, guidance counselors and principals we are settling for bare literacy in a world that requires highly advanced skills. The Klein rubric, the Education Equality Project is the wrong approach … using fear of school closings, denial of tenure and teacher pay for performance as a motivation tool is blaming schools for the failings of a larger society. The Broader, Bolder Coalition acknowledges that schools are part of communities, and, unless we address the school within its community we are spinning our wheels.

It may sound trite but as long as role models are athletes, entertainers and celebs our kids will look for “bling,” not math and physics.

The Lesson of No Child Left Behind: “You Don’t Fatten a Pig By Weighing It”

 

“every farmer knows you don’t fatten a pig by weighing it,” 

aphorism 

 

 

No Child Left Behind has dominated the national education scene for years. A bipartisan law, that was hailed as a major step forward increasingly is assailed by virtually all.

 

The law relies on States to establish goals, Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP), and sets increasingly severe penalties for schools that fail to reach AYP. Not surprisingly schools have moved to “drill and kill” curricula to achieve AYP, to the detriment of the subjects not tested.

 

The teacher unions, the NEA and the AFT have increasingly criticized the law, in fact, the supporters of the law continue to shrink.

 

 New Talk, sponsored a three day online discussion, “Do we need a basic re-write of NCLB?” –  the discussants included Randi Weingarten, (UFT/AFT President), Chris Cerf (DOE Deputy), Diane Ravitch, Sol Stern (City Journal), Checker Finn (Thomas Fordham Foundation), Philip Howard (Common Good), Arthur Levine (Woodrow Wilson Foundation, formerly Teacher College President), Sara Mead (New American Foundation) and a list of other “voices” in the educational community.

The discussion was hosted by John Merrow.

 

It is a must read!! 

 

The discussion evolved from spanking the law to offering a range of specific “new ideas,” both relating to the law and to educational policy in general. And, my dose of schedenfreude, watching Sol Stern skewer Chris Cerf as he tries, really hard, to be the neutral scholar-type instead of his true role, the Joel Klein hatchet man.

 

The original 1965 law, the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) drove federal dollars, Title I, to schools based on poverty. The dollars could not supplant tax levy dollars, and, frequently paid for “specialty” teachers in Reading, Math and Bi-Lingual/ESL education. The 2003 reauthorization changed the name of the law and added the AYP driven sanctions.

 

States are slow to make change, they are making incremental progress, for example, according to the National Governors Association, in establishing common measurements of graduation rates.

 

On the NCLB front views are across the spectrum.

 

Randi Weingarten laid out her “community school” plan and Checker Finn called it a distraction, lacking evidence.

 

Diane Ravitch addressed the testing issue in detail with targeted recommendations.

 

The New Talk discussion raised many questions, and answered few …

 

* What should be the role of the federal government?

* Can we trust States to measure their own progress?

* Do sanctions work?

* Should the law simply post test results and leave enforcement to the States?

* Shouldn’t we measure all students progress rather than the AYP concept?

 

While education has not emerged as an issue in the presidential election, aside from McCain attacking teacher unions, the reauthorization of NCLB will become a major issue in the next Congressional legislative session. The New Talk discussion clearly shows the lack of any consensus, but, it continues an increasingly public dialogue.

 

The outcome of this discussion, the still amorphous reauthorization, will shape American classrooms, for years, perhaps decades.

The Quest for the Leadership Gene: How Do We Find/Select the Best School Leaders?

 

Quietly, in the spring, the Department of Education introduced a test for principal candidates. For almost forty years candidates for New York City supervisory positions simply had to take courses and earn the appropriate supervisory certification from a college that has been approved by the State.

 

The civil service exam process lead by the Board of Examiners was overturned as a result of a lawsuit, Boston M. Chance, Louis Mercado v Board of Examiner, sustained on appeal in 1972, the Board of Examiners supervisory examination process was found to be discriminatory. The Board of Education decided not to challenge the decision of the trial judge.

 

The appeal comes to us in an unusual posture. Since plaintiffs attacked the method used to fill supervisory positions in the school system of the City of New York, one would surmise that their primary opposition would come from those in charge of that system, the Board of Education of the City of New York and its Chancellor, Harvey B. Scribner, both named as defendants in this action. However, although the Board of Education appeared below, it did not actively oppose the motion for a preliminary injunction and has not appealed from the district court’s order. The Chancellor has done even less. In a memorandum to the Board of Education, quoted by Judge Mansfield in his opinion, Mr. Scribner stated that to defend against plaintiffs’ case. “… would require that I both violate my own professional beliefs and defend a system of personnel selection and promotion which I no longer believe to be workable.”

 

Ironically the Board of Examiners, an independent public agency was created shortly after the consolidation of the boroughs into New York City in 1898 and the creation of a Board of Education. It was the brainchild of the reformers of the late nineteenth century, its purpose, to take the appointment of teachers and supervisors out of the hands of politicians and base their assignment on merit … on the results of civil service examinations with assignments to jobs based upon the grades on the civil service tests.

 

The Board of Education simply abandoned the examination system and placed the assignment of supervisors in the hands of the newly elected Community School Boards.

 

On paper the Department involved parents and teachers in the selection process (Chancellor’s Regulation C-30), in reality the selections made by school boards, in too many districts, were highly suspect. In spite of accusations that supervisory selections were driven by race, ethnic and religious groups, influenced by elected officials, and, in some cases outright “bought,” the system continued into the mid-nineties.

 

The Commissioner of Investigation, Ed Stancik, in coordination with the teachers’ union changed the law and took all personnel authority away from school boards.

 

One of the first major initiatives of the Bloomberg/Klein mayoral control was the creation of the Leadership Academy, a privately funded operation. In spite of the fanfare the Academy was simply top-down patronage … rather than jobs distributed by school boards we now had jobs meted out to friends of Joel.

 

Bob Knowling, a failed internet entrepreneur was chosen as the Leadership Academy head, at a salary of $250,000 plus perks.

 

In time the Academy cleaned up its act, selected Sondra Stein, a recognized scholar, as Chief Operating Officer.

 

The new competencies that are the core of the new “test” are crucial for the success of a principal.

 

However, “book knowledge” alone will not the great principal make.

 

Failing schools, i.e., SURR schools are always characterized by poor leadership.

A school leader may be able to analyze data, construct a budget, write an observation report, but, when they walk into the student cafeteria do the kids immediately stopping talk?

 

Are they master teachers? Can they model exemplary teaching?

 

Are they respected by the kids, teachers and parents?

 

Are they looked upon as leaders by those they lead?

 

In too many circumstances principals are not school leaders, they do not possess that difficult to define quality, the ability to inspire and lead by example.

 

Increasingly I have come to believe that some have that leadership gene and some do not. The new examination will filter out some, the Leadership Academy has stumbled, without school leaders that can lead schools will continue to sputter.

 

Bloomberg, Klein et. al., are entering their last year … no matter how much they pat themselves on the back data is stagnant.

 

Hopefully the next administration will understand that schools begin with school leaders … that friends of friends, carrots and stick and a duplicitous spinning of data are failed strategies.