Transforming the Teaching Profession
Eliminating the racial and ethnic achievement gap in our nation's public schools is the most urgent civil rights challenge for this generation.
I co-founded the Education Equality Project to address the injustice and inequity that African-American and Latino students confront every day in their schools.
Poor and minority students will never get their fair share of educational opportunity -- and are far more likely to lead unsuccessful lives -- until administrators and political leaders commit to fundamentally changing the way teachers are recruited, rewarded, and retained. The goal is as easy to articulate as it is hard to realize: that every classroom will one day be led by an effective instructor who demonstrably advances student learning.
Here are specific ways we can do it.
1) Lower irrelevant entry barriers to the teaching profession. Advanced degrees and certification are not linked to producing effective teachers, and traditional schools of education typically attract lower-achieving college students from less competitive institutions. Alternative certification programs, like the Defense Department's Troops to Teachers initiative, are already demonstrating that mid-career and retiring professionals could provide a rich source of new teaching talent, particularly in high-need subject areas in inner-city schools like math and science.
2) The federal government should require states and districts to develop longitudinal data systems that allow school administrators and principals to use value-added data to measure and track the impact teachers have on student achievement. To move toward a performance-based system for teachers, school districts will need to have information that tracks the effect that individual teachers are having on student performance from year-to-year for a number of years. Performance-based metrics must not only be fair but transparent.
3) States and districts should be encouraged and free to use a variety of outcome-based measures to evaluate teacher effectiveness. One proviso: any system that states devise to evaluate teacher performance should include student test scores as a key measuring stick--and should not succumb to the temptation to substitute input-based measures to gauge teacher effectiveness, like licensure status and education credentials, that have been shown to have no connection to effective teaching. While student test scores over a multiyear period should figure prominently in value-added assessments of teacher performance, they should not be the only measure of effectiveness.
4) Every school and district should assess and document the impact that probationary teachers have on student learning from the moment they enter the classroom. Fledgling teachers should receive better professional development support, including on-the-job mentoring and supervision from peers and master teachers. Just as barriers to entering the teaching profession should be lowered, barriers to earning tenure must be raised.
5) To transform tenure into a progress-based prerogative, states and districts should require tenure candidates to demonstrate that they are effectively boosting student learning. At the same time, the least-effective probationary instructors should be denied tenure.
6) To stem the suburban tide, urban school districts should pay large bonuses -- on the order, perhaps, of 25 percent of annual compensation -- to effective teachers who stay to teach disadvantaged students. Teachers who raise student achievement should receive large bonuses for teaching in high-poverty schools and extra compensation for teaching core subjects in shortage areas like math and science. At present, top-notch instructors often end up leaving inner-city schools to teach at suburban schools that are closer to home, less disruptive, and pay higher salaries.
7) Tenured teachers should periodically be reassessed to ensure that they are still raising student achievement. Tenured instructors who are doing a good job should receive significant merit pay hikes. But persistently incompetent teachers should be dismissed -- after getting a chance to improve their performance. In much the same spirit, unionized teachers should enjoy the due process protections and seniority rights afforded to other white-collar professionals -- but not be shielded by excessive due- process requirements from meaningful job performance assessments or layoffs.
Transforming the teaching profession into a merit-based system will not be easy. But urban school reform and closing the achievement gap can no longer be secondary to protecting the prerogatives of union representatives, district bureaucrats, and professors at teachers colleges. Some of the reforms we need to create real opportunity for disadvantaged students and boost learning for all students are sure to be politically charged. They threaten a vast educational establishment that for decades has privileged the needs of adults over children.
The good news is that this radical transformation of the teaching profession could again help make education the great equalizer in America -- and not an ongoing source of inequity and injustice.
On Saturday May 16th, on the 55th anniversary of Brown v. Board of Education I will be joining with civil rights leaders, education reformers, students, teachers, parents and concerned citizens at the White House Ellipse to issue a call to action. That call begins with improving teacher quality in our public education system.
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Where is the accountability for the students and parents? Once people stop blaming everyone else for their problems, then progress will be made. Parents need to be on their kids constantly to study and take their education seriously...in this "hip-hop" culture we live in, getting an education and studying hard in school is not glorified, the get rich quick bling bling mentality runs rampant and kids think its uncool to actually hunker down and study, so they don't, and of course are behind in life of those who actually worked their butts off to get an education. Its up to the parents to be on their kids not to fall into this trap.
Education needs a major overhaul, but I don't think bringing in uncertified people to teach is the answer. Today's world is more complex than ever, I think teachers should be the best educated people we can find. In light of that complexity, our curriculums need revising, and we need a massive infusion of technology into the classroom. Our kids go from the 21st century, using all kinds of high tech outside the classroom, then they come into the school and it is pretty much the same as mid 20th century (that's the dark ages to an 11 yr old) except for a computer here or there. There is so much we could do to engage our kids and instead we are driving experienced,caring people out of the profession with testing mania.
Good article. I have a teen who wants to be a teacher, which horrifies my spouse, as she's smart, high-scoring on standardized tests, and of course there are private sector jobs that pay much better. I want her to do what motivates and engages her, but I worry that she'll burn out in a profession where they typical employee, statistically, graduated in the BOTTOM 10% of their class, where mediocre is often good enough, where tenured administrators are in constant triage mode and cynical to the core, and where "taking on the bureaucracy" is the fast track to nowhere. Not to mention that teachers working in the city schools around here take their lives into their hands every day.
Your ideas are going to improve the education of targeted minorities, how? You don't really have much about urban teaching, just a whole lot of stuff about teachers in general. I'm on the periphery of this, but I have friends who have taken jobs at teachers in MPS (Milwaukee Public Schools), and from their stories focusing on the teachers is only one part of the puzzle to accomplishing better achievment. The most laughable idea is the one you chose to put first, that being a teacher should have some formal accredation. In Milwaukee, and I'm sure around other parts of the nation, there has been trouble at charter schools where teachers are not certified in the subjects they teach and poor student performance. Getting certified isn't that hard, and I'm sure students and parents would both appericient to know that the teacher actually knows what they are teaching. If you feel I'm wrong, then let's put Joe the Plumber in charge of civics and economics, I'm sure many students will come away with high test scores.
Unfortunately, Mr. Klein's early successes in shaking up the school bureaucracy in New York were his last. Principals and teachers alike have been demoralized by the continual reorganizations and empty evaluations. Success is measured by tests that are dumbed down to show progress. His ideas here about loosening criteria to attract enthusiastic and talented people to the teaching profession, but they ring hollow in light of the fact that a system-wife directive has frozen new hires, forcing recruitment of the thousands of teachers still on the payroll but made redundant.
the fastest and most immediate way to transform the teaching profession is to allow anyone who has an advanced, terminal, or professional degree to get their teaching license, without having to jump through hoops. secondly, teachers should be taught how to identify and nurture their own strengths, as well as how to teach using them. Next, raise teacher pay to be competetive with other professions in order to lure in a wider range of talent. Lastly, get rid of any teachers who cant teach, any administrators who cant lead, and any students who dont want to be there.
Other professions aren't given a three-month vacation. Other professions (ie. not just jobs) do not work for 6-8 hours a day. Professionals work as long as it takes to get the job done. When teachers do that, we can talk about compensating them like other professions.
Teachers are not given a three month vacation. There salary is prorated over a twelve month year. Teachers work after hours - grading, making lesson plans, and have to stay current by continuing to take professional development courses. If the job was as 'cushy' as you make it seem why are there teacher shortages? Why aren't people "nocking down doors to teach"? It's very hard work.
I MISSED the parts about parent accountability, and student accountability. I NOTICED the author is aware of how DISRUPTIVE (HIS word) students are in inner city schools relative to other schools.
Piss poor parenting skills need to be addressed. Schools that do not allow disruptive students to b e pulled from the classroom are part of the problem. parents that enable disruptive students, and defiant students need some parenting classes.
Teachers go into teaching not to babysit, be cursed at, slapped in the face, etc. But this was what happened at the inner city school that I worked at. It had 80% turnover. The school cited less detentions/suspensions as improvements, but they just cooked their books by not suspending students who should have been suspended.
I'm all for innovation:paying students who behave, get good grades, and aren't truant/tardy. It may take 20 years to teach a new generation, but then these incentives could be reduced/removed. Horrible student behavior is a BIG reason why teachers leave, or "can't teach."
Research shows that although socioeconomic factors and parental participation influence outcomes, by far the single most important determinant of student success is the teacher.
So long as some teachers continue to blame students and parents for the failure of the education system, we weill make no progress. I have to wonder why we bother to pay for teachers who claim they cannot succeed because of parents. What exactly are we paying FOR, then? Would we pay for a plumber who said it was not possible to fix the stopped toilet?
Some people look for reasons to fail; others find ways to succeed.
There is another problem. Let's stop holding the gifted kids back. I'm sick of derelict parents wanting to put their little mo..nsters in classes with smart kids so their kids won't feel bad. So many smart and capable children are being lost early because they are bored in class because the teacher is too busy trying to teach the slow, uninterested, or delinquent kids.
Speaking as a teacher and a parent,
I gotta say I agree. My kids are pretty bright--and they spend time waiting for the less-able learners to catch up.
We're spending a LOT of time, effort (and thus money) trying to help the bottom 5 - 10%.
I can't say for certain, but it seems like at my school the special education dept. is the fastest growing. Some spec. ed teachers are great, caring people who really 'save' kids who would otherwise just quit. But I'd like to see a study of what the cost/benefit is for the effort invested in those students who at that end of the achievement spectrum.
Then again, it can cost a lot to deal with people who have no useful skills.
And if my kid needed special help--I'd be really really glad to have the system we offer.
The phenomenon you describe is, I believe, real.
The problem, however, is not any child's parent.
It is, I assert, STANDARDS-based educational philosophy.
As opposed to POTENTIAL-based educational philosophy.
If I were running the universe all people appointed to governing boards would have to work at least 2 full years at the most difficult front line aspect of the job they are overseeing before they are allowed to express an opinion - let alone implement any policies. School board members and chancellors would get assigned a 2 year stint teaching in the most depressing high schools in their city. Police board members would have to pass officer training and complete 2 years as uniform patrol officers assigned to the housing projects or other more challenging neighborhoods. I suspect if we required people on the boards to actually have real experience over what they are trying to control Mr Kleins perspective might change.
I've worked in both in inner city public schools and in public safety/law enforcement environments. Both professions have to deal with people as they actually are, not as if they were identical interchangeable commodities with identical skills and behaviours. The real trick of improving inner city schools is improving the lives of the inner city kids and their parents outside of school - not winning points by demanding teachers - or any other profession be accountible for things they have little control over, or creating new irrelevent hoops to jump through.
To Skepticat,
You are right when you say: "The real trick of improving inner city schools is improving the lives of the inner city kids and their parents outside of school - not winning points by demanding teachers - or any other profession be accountible for things they have little control over, or creating new irrelevent hoops to jump through."
It is a good first step.
In another (huff)post, on one of the Banking issues some one talked about education for the real world, education about financial issues: mortgage, interest rates, credit cards etc etc and some one else over there talked about proper jobs and wages for parents, including vacation, health care etc so that they had the money and time to take care of their kids and families.... the way they need to. And all this is going to need the right policies and laws.... new ones....
This is all so exciting, wonderful.... we're all getting involved in democracy, talking to each other about important issues that affect our lives. Learning, discovering solutions, ideas...
Thanks HuffPost.
Truly said.
Thank you Huff Post.
The people speak here and are not filtered like in other media.
Something I would ad: Stop the nonsense about social promptions and reteaching. If a kid doesn't preform acceptable for their age level, hold them back and let them try again. As it is now, it's not uncommon to find an 11th grader who can't read and add. This holds back the progress of the entire classroom and cheats good students out of their education, as well as frustrating the teachers to the point they become resigned to marginal preformance for all.
Holding someone back seems like taking what didn't work, doing it again, and expecting a different result. Not a good idea.
With kids who have trouble with something, we do need to keep them from holding the rest of the class back. But holding them back isn't an effective way of doing it. One option is to cut something from their curriculum, and replace it with additional support for the subjects they're continuing with. I actually think we should have everyone learning calculus their senior year of high school. It's not actually that hard, despite its reputation, and it's useful for understanding a lot of other stuff. But you can live without it. You can also live without just about any of my favorite subjects: science, foreign language, civics, music .... . It's better to learn a few of them well, than to learn none of them well. Most people who have trouble with academics could learn it well with additional support.
For each regular class, have a supplemental class that covers the background for the following week's material in the corresponding regular class.
i have many more ideas.some of yours are great.how about we remove the government from education altogether.instead of paying.people who can dunk a basketball,run the 40 in 4.2,and can hit a ball a long ways.millions of dollars let's give it to teachers that deserve it.while we are at it.let's us add policeman,fireman,nurses,parent's,social working non profit organizations.if you people only knew who i am.this idea would surprise you.
Remember that athletes must perform brilliantly to get pay like that. You have to be a star -- and everyone is watching you do your work, and critiquing you while you do it. How many teachers would sign up for having cameras in their classrooms so that parents (the consumers) and the public (the people paying you) can decide whether you're doing a great job? In athletics, remember, it's all about merit pay. There's no seniority, there's no tenure, and when you're over the hill (after just a few years), you're out. What do you think about that approach for teachers?
Do you know of a group of taxpayers who want to pay me and my colleagues $40 mil a year each to do your jobs?
"instructors should be denied tenure."
You could have made this a lot simpler. Deny tenure to bad teachers (break the teacher's union). Merit based pay (my HS teachers might have gotten off their butts for a $5K bonus) and if a tenured teacher continues to fail, they should be canned.
More money doesn't solve the problem Washington D.C. nearly spends the most per pupil in the entire nation and it has the worst schools in America. More money for teachers is a great idea but it has to be mandatory not up to local districts through property taxes. And more $ for worthless teachers is a horrible idea. We need much better talent and if you can't do your job shouldn't be immune from firing. Time to take on the teacher's union. They'll whine and complain but if you care about minorities' education then it has to be done!
It's easy to say "fire the bad teachers," but it misses a lot of the reality of education. The lack of unions in charter and inner-city Catholic schools (one of the few private options in intensely urban areas) does not make their students perform better. What makes their students perform better (slightly better, anyway) is that the parents CARE and are INVOLVED in the process. In other words, they are self-selected populations. The ability to hire and fire teachers is basically irrelevant to student success.
Another problem is that the Duncan approach has caused a lot of GOOD teachers in Chicago to be fired when whole schools have been closed to make way for the charters. And despite rules that are supposedly intended to retain good teachers in such situations, practice has shown that there is severe hiring prejudice against those teachers who earnestly tried to hang on and save their neighborhood schools.
And then there's the phrase "bad teacher." Let me give you a little analogy: The current NCLB testing system is kind of like telling an ER surgeon that he will be fired if he doesn't reduce the number of patients who die on the operating table this year. How many factors are beyond that surgeon's control? Now imagine that surgeon is in a county hospital that deals with gang-related violence, and he is told he has to reach the same target as the doctor in the private suburban hospital. How fair is that?
And about those private schools--religious or not,
Do they have to do all the mandated special ed. work that public schools must do? That's a huge piece of the financial pie of public schools.
Also, those private schools can eject kids much more easily, if they're misbehaving, can't they?
I'm not saying we need to make our public schools more like private schools, but the private schools are freed from a lot of the burdens placed on public schools.
Simple basics and an emphasis on trade schools would make a big difference. People tend to look down on the trades as manual labor, but they often pay more than college grad jobs. They also provide the satisfaction of actually building something. I have a BA and MBA degree but chose to work as a house framer and contractor because of the independence it offers. Workman's comp laws make it difficult if not impossible to bring young people into an 'on the job training' situation, here in California. Attitude makes all the difference, not so much complex, teacher tracking formulas. These kids need the success and self respect that hard work often brings.
Check out the following "pre-buttal," from Diane Ravitch (HuffPo May 2007):
"I have a bold plan to make teaching a more attractive profession:
First, let's figure out why so many students are unwilling to behave in the classroom and do the work that is assigned to them.
Second, let's review the laws and court decisions that make it difficult to maintain a culture of high expectations and good behavior in the schools.
Third, let's make sure that schools have a solid curriculum in science, history, the arts, literature, and math so that teachers know what they are expected to teach and are well prepared to teach it.
Fourth, let's ease up on the testing mania and put the emphasis where it belongs: on providing a great education.
(snip -- see link for full closing para)
State and local education authorities should focus on improving the conditions in the schools so that teachers can do the job they prepared to do. "
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/diane-ravitch/how-to-fix-the-public-sch_b_47402.html
See also:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/diane-ravitch/the-unprinted-letter-abou_b_63011.html
Money quote: "It may be time to reflect on the possibility that a nation of good test-takers is not necessarily a well-educated nation."
Diane Ravitch is my hero! She's right to put student behavior at the top of the list of needed fixes --many of the brainiest, potentially-best teachers are rousted by horrendous student behavior --and not just in inner city schools --that goes unchecked because clueless school board members and superintendents think it can all be fixed by better lesson plans and warmer rapport. Permissive, spineless parenting (often exacerbated by divorce issues) trickles down into our schools. Every successful society throughout history has understood that its young need to be disciplined to keep unruly natural impulses from blocking important cultural transmission. One of the most baleful ideas to come out of Romanticism/The Sixties is that we should give youth free rein.
I'm suprised by Ravitch having these sensible views. Didn't she write for Reagan, etc. way back?
Some people evolve.
Those who do are, by definition, not Republicans.
Two problems with this. One is that the real change in education over the last thirty years has been the funding formulas used for allocating state and federal revenues for public education. It started with the elimination of the ESEA way back when. The second is that by and large the system has been dismantled to the point that I truly do worry that it can't be fixed. Everyone is fighting everyone, no one agrees on issues of curriculum or discipline. Lower test scores are indicators of an overall downward trend in achievement and all anyone wants to do is to blame someone else. Only 48% of Washington state 10th grade students are able to achieve grade level standards in math! NY recent scores indicate qualified improvements: " One possibility is that the gains that were observed from 2008 to 2009 were concentrated in the range of scores near the proficiency threshold. Boosting the scores of students near the threshold just a bit could push them over the bar without dramatically increasing the overall distribution of achievement." http://gothamschools.org/2009/05/08/ela-scores-are-up-but-by-how-much/
With test scores taking on increasing importance in teacher and administration retenton there is pressure. Where there is pressure, there is the path of least resistance. I would warn that there needs to be improved methods of validating appropriate administration processes.
All the teaching reforms in the world will not make one bit of difference until the REAL problem is addressed: the many minority kids who enter the system completely unready to learn.
What does this mean, unready to learn? If you were teaching music or dance, and your students showed up not knowing how to dance or how to play the piano, whose job would it be to enable them to learn? Do you suppose that some children are born genetically "unready to learn"? Biologically, all children are sponges for knowledge. They can't *help* learning. So the idea that a certain segment of children known as "minorities" are somehow "unready to learn" at age 5 is nonsense.
A child who has had parents reading to him/her since age 2 is typically more "ready to learn" in kindergarten than the child who has not. And this carries through once school starts as well - children with difficult home and neighborhood situations will be less likely to do homework or even pay attention in schools.
Stop blaming teachers - education is a socio-economic problem!
You've obviously never been a teacher! Go to your local elementary school and volunteer to be a reading tutor, please. Do this for one year. Then write and let me know what you think!
Well said.
What about the many "non-minority" students unready to learn?
Besides, what credentials do you have to make that comment?
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