Last year’s devastation has become this year’s hope

Another school year is about to end. Last year, we left feeling devastated knowing that many of our students would receive letters labeling them as failures and stripping away their self-confidence. If we sat back and did nothing a love of learning would be lost forever. But we did not sit back- we united. Teachers and parents fought back against billion dollar corporations and corrupt politicians. They had their “theories”, but never bothered or even cared to see the impact to the classrooms and dinner tables. In the age of supporting claims with evidence, we were asked to use blind faith to follow an education policy that would benefit corporations at the expense of the students.   Their rhetoric has lost its magic, their numbers simply don’t add up, and it turns out their King is nothing more than a jester.

 

While we continue to fight the attacks from outside our communities, the goal must be to rebuild from within.

 

Last year’s devastation has become this year’s hope.

 

 

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The formula for NY teacher evals is revealed!

A study from the Bookings Institute concludes what many have already known for quite sometime, student test scores play a significant role in determining the value of homes.

http://www.brookings.edu/~/media/Files/rc/papers/2012/0419_school_inequality_rothwell/0419_school_inequality_rothwell.pdf

Now that test scores have fallen across the state of NY, they will no longer factor into the value of homes as they have in the past.  Imagine a realtor trying to use a district’s 46% passing rate as a talking point to prospective homebuyers?

If test scores can no longer be a dominating factor in determining the value of homes, what will replace it?  NYSED Commissioner John King has the answer- teacher ratings!

On October 22, 2013 John King claimed, “the state will release the breakdown of teachers’ scores by district in “late fall or early winter,”  along with a more detailed analysis of scores of every teacher in NY.  In a false accountability scale, most teachers made the grade.  With 70% of students failing the tests, many districts have taken it upon themselves to increase the “rigor” of teacher evaluations so that teachers’ ratings more accurately reflect student scores on flawed high-stakes tests.  Teachers are left with the herculean task of having more students pass and by much greater margins.  Ultimately, teachers’ ratings will fall because they have no control over constantly changing cut scores.

As John King continually points out during his forums, so much of the responsibility is in the hands of the local districts.  In an effort to produce minimal/short-term gains through a “rigorous” resetting of expected student growth, districts are about to cause long-term damage to the value of their homes.  Would you move into a district with 100% effective and highly effective teachers or 78%?  Districts need to resist the urge of falling on their own swords for a king that will not support them.

For 2013-14 and 2014-15- if a teacher is rated “ineffective” or “developing, Governor Cuomo has agreed to remove the state tests (20%).  The locally selected test moves up from 20% to 40% of the teacher evaluation.  If a district uses state tests for local scores (many did this to save students from having to take additional tests, especially in the K-2 range), they will use observation for 100% of the scores.

None of this makes sense, but it makes lots of dollars for corporations.  Through these unfunded mandates, we are removing the funding for instruction/class sizes and placing it into a system of accountability that clearly does not work for students.

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One child’s rigor is another child’s mental breakdown

The most valuable assessments in schools today is the running record. Running records measure both fluency and comprehension for each student. From this data, teachers can determine the appropriate level to instruct a child in reading. Teachers can also determine the child’s “frustration” level. “Frustration” is determined when a child’s accuracy falls below 90% or there is a complete lack of comprehension. Testing young children to the point of “frustration” may sound inhumane, but it is for a very brief moment in time and the assessment is done in a 1:1 setting. The teacher can end the assessment at any point.

Teachers are well aware of the reading levels for each child in their classroom. They are also aware of each child’s “frustration” level. While it is good practice to instruct students at or above their reading levels, it makes no sense at all to test a child for 3 days and over 500 minutes with text levels that are clearly defined at or above “frustration” level. Yet, that is exactly what the NYSED Common Core tests are all about. While Pearson and NYSED continue to produce costly and time consuming assessments, classroom teachers and parents have all the data they need. In the quest of rigor, we have abandoned common sense and the best teaching practices.

One child’s rigor is another child’s mental breakdown.

Forget the Politicians & Get Your Schools Back

NY school children will start the year with Cuomo as their Governor, Common Core as their standards, high-stakes testing as their measuring stick, John King as their Commissioner of Ed (?) , and their teachers will be tied to a system that no one can make sense of.

We have been screaming, “HELP” but the politicians are not listening. If we keep waiting for politicians to save us, we will continue to be disappointed. The change we seek can only come from within.

The success we have seen this year has been on the local level. Rather than walk away broken and discouraged, green laced students were prepared for the year. Green laced students started the year feeling brilliant and spent every school day proving it. Green laced teachers refused to see their students as tests scores. Instead, they saw their students as the hope and promise of this country. Green laced teachers refused to enter a competition with their colleagues and instead embraced collaboration with a focus on best practices- not flawed test scores. Green laced parents didn’t doubt their children because of test scores and many refused to have their students subject to them. In a system designed to show our students as failures- parents, teachers, and students have united in a bold and impossible symbol to ignore- green laces.

This movement desperately wants to swing for the fences and hit a homerun. Homeruns gather attention, but don’t always win games.  Forget the politicians and get your schools back.

As one