Every profession accepts merit pay. All people in the Real Working World accept having their income tied to their job performance. Why should teachers be any different?
That's the standard line. Only it isn't true.
Here's a quick report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. This particular piece only covers 2006-2009, but it's unlikely that the stats we're looking at have changed dramatically.
What percentage of the private workforce-- you know, that private sector where "everybody" accepts having their pay tied to their results-- how much of that private work-force is composed of workers whose earnings are tied to sales or output?
5%.
Additionally, of those identified as sales workers, only 20% were incentive-based. In other words, even in the sales world, the one sector where we might have legitimately assumed "everyone" works strictly on merit pay, only one in five workers has his earnings tied to his job performance.
We could get into the other lie here-- that merit pay actually gets better work out of people in general or teachers in particular-- but let's leave that for another day so that we can let these cold, hard statistics sink in.
Everybody in the private sector does not work for incentive or merit pay.
Monday, January 4, 2016
Sunday, January 3, 2016
How SAT Saves Market Share
The College Board, manufacturers and sellers of the SAT "suite" of tests as well as AP materials, has been struggling to regain share of the lucrative college gateway test market.
Not that they're hurting. When the company brought in Gasper Caperton to help solve some cash flow issues, he announced that he didn't want to run just "a testing company." Caperton boosted fees, increased market by (among other things) getting states to punch PSAT tickets for students, and selling student information to colleges. Revenue reports for the non-profit College Board run from "$500 million to $1 billion" The College Board's Form 990 from 2013 shows total revenue of $840,672,990 with a whopping $98,894,865 left over after expenses.
The College Board is a non-profit, which means it doesn't have to share any of that $100 million profit with shareholders or owners. When Caperton left, he was making more than the head of Harvard, more than the head of the American Red Cross. Nineteen other executives were making over $300K. David Coleman, in his first full year of head honchoship after being hired mid-2012, received a full $734,192 in compensation.
Meanwhile, the SAT is battling for market share with ACT. Part of that battle has involved a technique familiar to manufacturers of soft drinks and beer-- create a larger line of products to suck up space in the store and build market loyalty among customers. To that end, the College Board has rolled out a full range of products, allowing students to start taking some version of the SAT as early as eight grade.
There has been a full court press of PR for the New! Improved! SAT, but the College Board has not banked simply on selling the SAT experience one hopeful and terrified high school junior at a time.
One of the selling points of the new test has been its alignment with the Common Core, but that's not a selling point just (or even) for individual test takers. It has allowed the College Board to pitch their test to entire states.
After all-- the federal government still says that states must give a Big Standardized Test at least once to high school students. And the test ought to be aligned to the state standards. And hey-- look at that! David Coleman, architect of the Common Core is now head of the College Board. The SAT should serve as a suitable BS Tests right out of the box!
And so last year, the College Board underbid and overlobbied the ACT to win the contract to be the exit exam for Michigan schools. The state of Connecticut has dumped the SBAC and replaced it with the SAT. Colorado is about to switch over to the SAT for its juniors. New Hampshire is also on the list, along with Delaware. (Idaho and Alaska require students to take one of several choices which include the SAT). About fifteen states require taking the ACT.
Is there some benefit in this mandatory testing? Do students get a special boost on their way out the door? Do states get a big PR edge (you know those kids from Statesylvania-- they're always better at everything because they have to take the SAT)? Is their research indicating that Big Standardized Tests, especially ones manufactured by experienced test manufacturers, are a good predictor of anything other than socio-economc background? Or should we pay attention to the research that shows that high schools grades are the best predictors of college success? Did anyone benefit from the PSAT rollout fiasco this year?
What is the actual benefit to, well-- anybody in making every student take the SAT or ACT?
There's only one benefit that's immediately clear-- the benefit to test manufacturer's bottom line. The SAT is working to claw back market share by selling their test product, in bulk, to folks in state capitols so that taxpayers can go ahead and foot the bill for students who neither want or need to take the test. It's marketing genius, even if it has no actual educational benefit and costs the taxpayers a bundle. And it's a double win for the test manufacturers-- the more students who take the test, the more data the test manufacturers have to sell off to colleges and other interested parties. Ka-ching!
The college of your choice may not care about the SAT. The experts say not to take the SAT, not this year. But in some locations, your state government says you must take the test. Because, reasons. Ka-ching.
Not that they're hurting. When the company brought in Gasper Caperton to help solve some cash flow issues, he announced that he didn't want to run just "a testing company." Caperton boosted fees, increased market by (among other things) getting states to punch PSAT tickets for students, and selling student information to colleges. Revenue reports for the non-profit College Board run from "$500 million to $1 billion" The College Board's Form 990 from 2013 shows total revenue of $840,672,990 with a whopping $98,894,865 left over after expenses.
The College Board is a non-profit, which means it doesn't have to share any of that $100 million profit with shareholders or owners. When Caperton left, he was making more than the head of Harvard, more than the head of the American Red Cross. Nineteen other executives were making over $300K. David Coleman, in his first full year of head honchoship after being hired mid-2012, received a full $734,192 in compensation.
Meanwhile, the SAT is battling for market share with ACT. Part of that battle has involved a technique familiar to manufacturers of soft drinks and beer-- create a larger line of products to suck up space in the store and build market loyalty among customers. To that end, the College Board has rolled out a full range of products, allowing students to start taking some version of the SAT as early as eight grade.
There has been a full court press of PR for the New! Improved! SAT, but the College Board has not banked simply on selling the SAT experience one hopeful and terrified high school junior at a time.
One of the selling points of the new test has been its alignment with the Common Core, but that's not a selling point just (or even) for individual test takers. It has allowed the College Board to pitch their test to entire states.
After all-- the federal government still says that states must give a Big Standardized Test at least once to high school students. And the test ought to be aligned to the state standards. And hey-- look at that! David Coleman, architect of the Common Core is now head of the College Board. The SAT should serve as a suitable BS Tests right out of the box!
And so last year, the College Board underbid and overlobbied the ACT to win the contract to be the exit exam for Michigan schools. The state of Connecticut has dumped the SBAC and replaced it with the SAT. Colorado is about to switch over to the SAT for its juniors. New Hampshire is also on the list, along with Delaware. (Idaho and Alaska require students to take one of several choices which include the SAT). About fifteen states require taking the ACT.
Is there some benefit in this mandatory testing? Do students get a special boost on their way out the door? Do states get a big PR edge (you know those kids from Statesylvania-- they're always better at everything because they have to take the SAT)? Is their research indicating that Big Standardized Tests, especially ones manufactured by experienced test manufacturers, are a good predictor of anything other than socio-economc background? Or should we pay attention to the research that shows that high schools grades are the best predictors of college success? Did anyone benefit from the PSAT rollout fiasco this year?
What is the actual benefit to, well-- anybody in making every student take the SAT or ACT?
There's only one benefit that's immediately clear-- the benefit to test manufacturer's bottom line. The SAT is working to claw back market share by selling their test product, in bulk, to folks in state capitols so that taxpayers can go ahead and foot the bill for students who neither want or need to take the test. It's marketing genius, even if it has no actual educational benefit and costs the taxpayers a bundle. And it's a double win for the test manufacturers-- the more students who take the test, the more data the test manufacturers have to sell off to colleges and other interested parties. Ka-ching!
The college of your choice may not care about the SAT. The experts say not to take the SAT, not this year. But in some locations, your state government says you must take the test. Because, reasons. Ka-ching.
Simple Sabotage (h/t CIA)
In the 1940's the Office of Strategic Services was the US precursor to the CIA, collecting information and taking covert action in support of US interests overseas.
Well, now you, too, can enjoy the secrets of subterfuge by perusing the 1944 OSS classic, Simple Sabotage Field Manual. I am not making this up. Last year the CIA de-classified the manual, and you can now give it a read. It's actually a brief thirty-four pamphlet-sized pages, and while I've read it, you may well want to take a look. Does it have applications in the education world? Oh, my. Yes.
First, what audience was such a manual designed for?
Sabotage varies from highly technical coup de main acts that require detailed planning and the use of specially-trained operatives, to innumerable simple acts which the ordinary individual citizen-saboteur can perform. This paper is primarily concerned with the latter type.
No special equipment is involved; no high risk is faced. Just simple things you can do to screw up an enterprise with ordinary tools you'll find lying around the house.
The manual contains some words about motivating the civilian saboteur-- making him feel he's part of a larger cause, fighting destructive foes. But then we get to the fun-- the specific techniques.
The most simple principle is reversing thinking-- you can screw up an enterprise just by being lazy and careless. Let your tools get dull. Make dumb mistakes at work. "Frequently you can 'get away' with such acts under the cover of pretending stupidity, ignorance, over-caution, fear of being suspected of sabotage, or weakness and dullness due to undernourishment."
But the manual has more specifics as well. There are many pages about how to mess up buildings, engines, water supplies, radio, even movies. But it's when we get to more office and managerial concerns that some of this sabotage will start to sound familiar.
The really choice stuff comes under the heading of How To Screw Up Organizations and Conferences. To make a mess out of these, you can do some of the following:
* Insist on always working through channels; oppose efficiency
* Make "speeches." Talk as frequently as possible and at great length. Illustrate your "points" by long anecdotes and accounts of personal experiences. Never hesitate to make a few appropriate "patriotic" comments.
* When possible, refer all matters to committees, for "further study and consideration." Attempt to make the committees as large as possible — never less than five.
* Bring up irrelevant issues as frequently as possible.
Does this seem like some of the committee meetings at your school, or on the legislative level? Shall I remind you that these are the CIA's instructions on how to make committees NOT work.
If you are a manager or supervisor, you can screw up your area with the following (to list a few)
* always demand written instructions, then misunderstand them
* insist on high quality materials that are hard to get
* insist on perfect work on relatively unimportant products
* assign the worst people to the most important jobs
* destroy morale by being pleasant to lousy workers and unpleasant to good ones
* call meetings when work needs to be done
* multiply paperwork
If you are an employee, you can screw things up with these techniques
* work slowly; contrive many interruptions
* never pass on your skill or experience to new workers
* mix good parts with scrap
Of course, if you wanted to screw up a system, you could force workers to do these things.
Finally, techniques to just generally ruin morale and create confusion
* Give lengthy and incomprehensible explanations
* Act stupid
Some of the manual deals very specifically with Nazi occupiers, but there's plenty in the manual that applies in more general ways, ways that may seem very familiar to some folks. The next time you are watching the actions of local, state or federal folks in education and thinking, "Man, they couldn't screw things up worse if they were doing it on purpose"-- well, now you have some support for the truth of that statement.
Well, now you, too, can enjoy the secrets of subterfuge by perusing the 1944 OSS classic, Simple Sabotage Field Manual. I am not making this up. Last year the CIA de-classified the manual, and you can now give it a read. It's actually a brief thirty-four pamphlet-sized pages, and while I've read it, you may well want to take a look. Does it have applications in the education world? Oh, my. Yes.
First, what audience was such a manual designed for?
Sabotage varies from highly technical coup de main acts that require detailed planning and the use of specially-trained operatives, to innumerable simple acts which the ordinary individual citizen-saboteur can perform. This paper is primarily concerned with the latter type.
No special equipment is involved; no high risk is faced. Just simple things you can do to screw up an enterprise with ordinary tools you'll find lying around the house.
The manual contains some words about motivating the civilian saboteur-- making him feel he's part of a larger cause, fighting destructive foes. But then we get to the fun-- the specific techniques.
The most simple principle is reversing thinking-- you can screw up an enterprise just by being lazy and careless. Let your tools get dull. Make dumb mistakes at work. "Frequently you can 'get away' with such acts under the cover of pretending stupidity, ignorance, over-caution, fear of being suspected of sabotage, or weakness and dullness due to undernourishment."
But the manual has more specifics as well. There are many pages about how to mess up buildings, engines, water supplies, radio, even movies. But it's when we get to more office and managerial concerns that some of this sabotage will start to sound familiar.
The really choice stuff comes under the heading of How To Screw Up Organizations and Conferences. To make a mess out of these, you can do some of the following:
* Insist on always working through channels; oppose efficiency
* Make "speeches." Talk as frequently as possible and at great length. Illustrate your "points" by long anecdotes and accounts of personal experiences. Never hesitate to make a few appropriate "patriotic" comments.
* When possible, refer all matters to committees, for "further study and consideration." Attempt to make the committees as large as possible — never less than five.
* Bring up irrelevant issues as frequently as possible.
Does this seem like some of the committee meetings at your school, or on the legislative level? Shall I remind you that these are the CIA's instructions on how to make committees NOT work.
If you are a manager or supervisor, you can screw up your area with the following (to list a few)
* always demand written instructions, then misunderstand them
* insist on high quality materials that are hard to get
* insist on perfect work on relatively unimportant products
* assign the worst people to the most important jobs
* destroy morale by being pleasant to lousy workers and unpleasant to good ones
* call meetings when work needs to be done
* multiply paperwork
If you are an employee, you can screw things up with these techniques
* work slowly; contrive many interruptions
* never pass on your skill or experience to new workers
* mix good parts with scrap
Of course, if you wanted to screw up a system, you could force workers to do these things.
Finally, techniques to just generally ruin morale and create confusion
* Give lengthy and incomprehensible explanations
* Act stupid
Some of the manual deals very specifically with Nazi occupiers, but there's plenty in the manual that applies in more general ways, ways that may seem very familiar to some folks. The next time you are watching the actions of local, state or federal folks in education and thinking, "Man, they couldn't screw things up worse if they were doing it on purpose"-- well, now you have some support for the truth of that statement.
Gates Odd Good News
Back in mid-December, Bill Gates blogged about the top six good news stories of 2015. It's a fair enough list except for one notable and head-scratching inclusion.
Items on the list include:
* Africa went a year without a single polio case.
* Neil deGrasse Tyson won an award and made a bad-ass short speech in support of science
* The Nobel Prize went to developers of a cure for a widespread disease for the poor
* Mobile banking did really well in Kenya
* Rubella appears to have been wiped out in the Americas
And those are all pretty good news stories, even if they aren't particularly sexy or mainstream media-ready. But the list also includes this item (at spot #4)
* Khan Academy offers free SAT prep
First of all, unless you have access to a free computer with free internet connections, the Khan Academy materials are not "free."
Second, I have even better news-- nobody needs to take the damn SAT in the first place! The SAT test is a product produced by a for-profit corporation; why Gates wants to include a advertisement for that company in the midst of his "good news" is a puzzler. Not only that, but it is the number two product of its type, in the midst of a redesign to claw back some market share from the ACT.
There are so many odd assumptions buried here, not the least of which is the idea that everyone should go to college and everyone needs to take the SAT to get there.
But more significant is the repeat of the notion that the only reason that socio-economic status correlates so strongly with standardized test results is that wealthy folks have better access to test prep materials. It's the same batch of assumptions we find in Gates support of the Common Core-- a standardized test is an excellent measure of your education, and a good education is just a big bunch of test prep for that test. So Common Core, a giant test prep program from CCSS Big Standardized Tests, is a Good Thing that will benefit the poor.
Sometimes I think public education advocates really way overthink Gates' support of ed reforminess, ascribing all sorts of Byzantine motivations and wheels within wheels when really, it's just as simple as a really rich, smart, powerful guy who never spent much time in school and who has a seriously stunted, small and flat-out wrong idea of how education works.
Items on the list include:
* Africa went a year without a single polio case.
* Neil deGrasse Tyson won an award and made a bad-ass short speech in support of science
* The Nobel Prize went to developers of a cure for a widespread disease for the poor
* Mobile banking did really well in Kenya
* Rubella appears to have been wiped out in the Americas
And those are all pretty good news stories, even if they aren't particularly sexy or mainstream media-ready. But the list also includes this item (at spot #4)
* Khan Academy offers free SAT prep
First of all, unless you have access to a free computer with free internet connections, the Khan Academy materials are not "free."
Second, I have even better news-- nobody needs to take the damn SAT in the first place! The SAT test is a product produced by a for-profit corporation; why Gates wants to include a advertisement for that company in the midst of his "good news" is a puzzler. Not only that, but it is the number two product of its type, in the midst of a redesign to claw back some market share from the ACT.
There are so many odd assumptions buried here, not the least of which is the idea that everyone should go to college and everyone needs to take the SAT to get there.
But more significant is the repeat of the notion that the only reason that socio-economic status correlates so strongly with standardized test results is that wealthy folks have better access to test prep materials. It's the same batch of assumptions we find in Gates support of the Common Core-- a standardized test is an excellent measure of your education, and a good education is just a big bunch of test prep for that test. So Common Core, a giant test prep program from CCSS Big Standardized Tests, is a Good Thing that will benefit the poor.
Sometimes I think public education advocates really way overthink Gates' support of ed reforminess, ascribing all sorts of Byzantine motivations and wheels within wheels when really, it's just as simple as a really rich, smart, powerful guy who never spent much time in school and who has a seriously stunted, small and flat-out wrong idea of how education works.
ICYMI: Big List for the New Year!
Must be the holidays-- either I was reading more or people were writing more. But the list of must-reads this week is long.
In America, Only the Rich Can Afford To Write about Poverty
This came out back in August, but this Guardian piece by Barbara Ehrenreich (Nickled and Dimed) reflecting on how most writing about poverty is done by people who are anything but poor-- this is well worth the read.
The Inside Story on What Really Caused the Occupy Wall Streer Movement To Collapse
Another non-education piece, but in the process of talking about the meltdown of the Occupy movement by an insider, this has much to say about how movements can lose their way,
The Martian Allegory of Whose Lives Matter
Paul Thomas's brain lives at he intersection of deep thinking and pop culture, and consequently he produces pieces that nobody else can. Here he takes a look at The Martian and what it tells us about just who is worth time, effort and expense to save.
Staring Down Goliath
Super profile of Justin Oakley, the Just Let Me Teach wristbands, and his new message to teachers-- Vote. Or. Die.
Gross National Happiness
From the Teacher Tom blog-- a look at other ways of measuring the success of children.
Students, Not Standards in 2016
Yes, Paul Thomas again, this time remembering an influential teacher in his own life, and reminding us where the focus should be in a classroom.
Look Out 2016
At educarenow, Bill Boyle takes a look at the language of deficit and how a few simple word choices signal a serious problem in approaching the "problems" of schools.
Um-- There Are These Kids We Call Students
Ah, a rant after my own heart. Blue Cereal Education rips reformers about the use of students as passive props in their reformy melodrama.
Of course, the end of the year is always a time for listicles. Consider this top post list from the always-essential Jose Luis Vilson or this list of book recommendations from Russ Walsh or check out Nancy Bailey's list of good news from 2015 and even Rick Hess's tongue-in-cheek list of 2016 news stories.
And finally, here's Valerie Strauss and Carol Burris's primer on why nobody is exactly excited about having John King as Acting Pretend Secretary of Education.
In America, Only the Rich Can Afford To Write about Poverty
This came out back in August, but this Guardian piece by Barbara Ehrenreich (Nickled and Dimed) reflecting on how most writing about poverty is done by people who are anything but poor-- this is well worth the read.
The Inside Story on What Really Caused the Occupy Wall Streer Movement To Collapse
Another non-education piece, but in the process of talking about the meltdown of the Occupy movement by an insider, this has much to say about how movements can lose their way,
The Martian Allegory of Whose Lives Matter
Paul Thomas's brain lives at he intersection of deep thinking and pop culture, and consequently he produces pieces that nobody else can. Here he takes a look at The Martian and what it tells us about just who is worth time, effort and expense to save.
Staring Down Goliath
Super profile of Justin Oakley, the Just Let Me Teach wristbands, and his new message to teachers-- Vote. Or. Die.
Gross National Happiness
From the Teacher Tom blog-- a look at other ways of measuring the success of children.
Students, Not Standards in 2016
Yes, Paul Thomas again, this time remembering an influential teacher in his own life, and reminding us where the focus should be in a classroom.
Look Out 2016
At educarenow, Bill Boyle takes a look at the language of deficit and how a few simple word choices signal a serious problem in approaching the "problems" of schools.
Um-- There Are These Kids We Call Students
Ah, a rant after my own heart. Blue Cereal Education rips reformers about the use of students as passive props in their reformy melodrama.
Of course, the end of the year is always a time for listicles. Consider this top post list from the always-essential Jose Luis Vilson or this list of book recommendations from Russ Walsh or check out Nancy Bailey's list of good news from 2015 and even Rick Hess's tongue-in-cheek list of 2016 news stories.
And finally, here's Valerie Strauss and Carol Burris's primer on why nobody is exactly excited about having John King as Acting Pretend Secretary of Education.
Saturday, January 2, 2016
Resolutions for USED
After I earlier took a swipe at Acting Pretend Secretary of Education John King's resolutions for the new year, blogger, author, activist and fellow trombonist Jose Luis Vilson asked me what my resolutions would be, were I the Secretary of Education. It's a fun question, so here we go-- if hell froze over and I were writing the resolutions for the Ed Secretary's office, here's what I would resolve:
That we will do everything possible to see that each community in America has the tools and support it needed to create and maintain the great local school system that it dreamed of.
That means local control, local decision-making, local vision of what the schools should be. Every single community in America is different, and that means that every school is different, with different needs, goals, resources and aspirations. And nobody knows all of those factors better than the people in that community. But not all communities have the resources and support needed to make their dreams real. We will make sure that the USED is there to get them those resources-- and that does not mean giving some corporation a contract to provide what we decide the community needs. We will not tell the community what they need; they will tell us. If that means a lot of corporate interests go hungry, so be it.
We will not be there to tell them what "great" must look like or what goals they must embrace, or else. We will be there to make sure that no school's vision denies basic principles of democracy or law in this country; no community will be allowed to exclude or deny some families their hope for their children's future. There can be no great schools without justice.
We will also be there to demand that our fellow agencies help. Where poverty, racism, and chaos are disrupting a community, it is hard to build a great school. Partnership between state and federal government can help build the solid community foundation on which communities can build great schools.
We will not abandon communities by silencing democracy and closing schools. We will strive for an America in which no community is left behind, stripped of voice and forced to send its children elsewhere. We will not try to enforce a one-size-fits-all top-down definition of excellence on every community in America.
That we will end the tyranny of federally mandated standardized testing.
Yes, annual standardized tests of reading and math are written into the ESSA, and I resolve that the department will devote a budget of $1.99 and three hours a week from our youngest intern to making sure that law is followed.
Big Standardized Tests have made a twisted toxic mess out of education policy. We're done. Just as in the past we have bent the rules to enforce policy that had no force of law behind it, we will find ways to discourage the scourge of BS Testing.
That we will seek out and include teacher voices. Also, parents and students.
I am going to track down the teachers who are strong, influential forces for good in their communities. I will not have them apply to come be heard and insist that they be vetted for unwelcome attitudes. I will track them down, find where they teach, travel to sit in their classrooms, and listen to what they have to say. I mean, actually listen. Does that sound time consuming? Very well-- I will travel the public schools of this country in a well-teched-out bus. After all, what reason is there for me to be hunkered down in DC, other than it makes it easier for lobbyists to find me in the office. For more than half of my work year, I will run this office from the road.
That market forces are incompatible with a free, open, equitable public education system, and we will say so, and act like we mean it.
Period. Not since trickle-down economics has such a groundless basis for policy gotten as much play as "market forces will make public schools excellent." It's baloney. We're done with it.
Finally, about this job.
There's so much more I could resolve about, but King kept his list to just three items and I've already doubled that. So let me finish by resolving to give this job to somebody way wiser than I am so that I can get back to my own classroom.
That we will do everything possible to see that each community in America has the tools and support it needed to create and maintain the great local school system that it dreamed of.
That means local control, local decision-making, local vision of what the schools should be. Every single community in America is different, and that means that every school is different, with different needs, goals, resources and aspirations. And nobody knows all of those factors better than the people in that community. But not all communities have the resources and support needed to make their dreams real. We will make sure that the USED is there to get them those resources-- and that does not mean giving some corporation a contract to provide what we decide the community needs. We will not tell the community what they need; they will tell us. If that means a lot of corporate interests go hungry, so be it.
We will not be there to tell them what "great" must look like or what goals they must embrace, or else. We will be there to make sure that no school's vision denies basic principles of democracy or law in this country; no community will be allowed to exclude or deny some families their hope for their children's future. There can be no great schools without justice.
We will also be there to demand that our fellow agencies help. Where poverty, racism, and chaos are disrupting a community, it is hard to build a great school. Partnership between state and federal government can help build the solid community foundation on which communities can build great schools.
We will not abandon communities by silencing democracy and closing schools. We will strive for an America in which no community is left behind, stripped of voice and forced to send its children elsewhere. We will not try to enforce a one-size-fits-all top-down definition of excellence on every community in America.
That we will end the tyranny of federally mandated standardized testing.
Yes, annual standardized tests of reading and math are written into the ESSA, and I resolve that the department will devote a budget of $1.99 and three hours a week from our youngest intern to making sure that law is followed.
Big Standardized Tests have made a twisted toxic mess out of education policy. We're done. Just as in the past we have bent the rules to enforce policy that had no force of law behind it, we will find ways to discourage the scourge of BS Testing.
That we will seek out and include teacher voices. Also, parents and students.
I am going to track down the teachers who are strong, influential forces for good in their communities. I will not have them apply to come be heard and insist that they be vetted for unwelcome attitudes. I will track them down, find where they teach, travel to sit in their classrooms, and listen to what they have to say. I mean, actually listen. Does that sound time consuming? Very well-- I will travel the public schools of this country in a well-teched-out bus. After all, what reason is there for me to be hunkered down in DC, other than it makes it easier for lobbyists to find me in the office. For more than half of my work year, I will run this office from the road.
That market forces are incompatible with a free, open, equitable public education system, and we will say so, and act like we mean it.
Period. Not since trickle-down economics has such a groundless basis for policy gotten as much play as "market forces will make public schools excellent." It's baloney. We're done with it.
Finally, about this job.
There's so much more I could resolve about, but King kept his list to just three items and I've already doubled that. So let me finish by resolving to give this job to somebody way wiser than I am so that I can get back to my own classroom.
PA: Big Bucks, Big Data and Big Kafka
For the "Maybe You Got Into the Wrong Line of Work" file, courtesy of the fine people at Opt Out Pennsylvania.
Pennsylvania's Department of Education late in 2015 (back when our legislature's failure to pass a budget was just a disaster and not yet an appalling, embarrassing disaster) awarded a grant for the expansion of the Pennsylvania Information Management System (PIMS).
The expansion is supposed to make the educator dashboard "more usable, enhance its functionality and increase dashboard adoption by stakeholders." In other words, the state has noticed that hardly anybody uses PIMS because it's a huge pain in the butt that yields little useful information but takes half of your planning period just to try to navigate.
The state would also like to "provide training to participating LEAs and have access to tools and professional support materials that assist them to better use data to support instructional decision-making." In other words, they would like us to use test results to decide what to do in our classroom.
Of course, part of the problem with using test data to drive instruction is that in PA, as in many states, the intellectual property interests of the test manufacturers are valued over the instructional interests of the schools, teachers, and students. Before we give the test, we all take sign an oath that we will not look at the test, and if we inadvertently see it, we will never ever reveal what we've seen or use it with our students.
When we get test results, we see, at first, raw scores. That's it. Eventually, in some years, we may see a breakdown by standards (Chris got score X for "drawing inferences"). But we will never, ever, see exactly what questions were missed by which students, or what wrong answers they chose. It is the very definition of Kafkaesque-- this student took a test and got this grade, and you must insure that the student gets a better grade next time, but you may not see any of the specifics of this test nor anything that might show you exactly where the student messed up.
You must shoot at a target in the dark. We will tell you whether you hit the target or not, but not which direction you were off. Now shoot again and do better.
It does not appear that any of that is going to be fixed. But we will get a shinier website for looking at the useless data. Yay?
The grant is also so that PIMS can be improved as a one stop shop "to expand capacity for research and evaluation by creating more open and transparent access to education data overall. Establish a state research agenda, form collaborative research partnerships and increase internal capacity to conduct research." In other words, we need to fix the things up so that we can more easily share student data with way more people.
How many tax dollars have been put behind this newly improvey initiative? Over the next four years, the state is granting $6,999,928 to this task (I really wish I could have heard the conversation in whch someone decided to hold back the $72 to make this an even seven million). I cannot wait to see what almost-seven-million buys you for a data system.
Pennsylvania's Department of Education late in 2015 (back when our legislature's failure to pass a budget was just a disaster and not yet an appalling, embarrassing disaster) awarded a grant for the expansion of the Pennsylvania Information Management System (PIMS).
The expansion is supposed to make the educator dashboard "more usable, enhance its functionality and increase dashboard adoption by stakeholders." In other words, the state has noticed that hardly anybody uses PIMS because it's a huge pain in the butt that yields little useful information but takes half of your planning period just to try to navigate.
The state would also like to "provide training to participating LEAs and have access to tools and professional support materials that assist them to better use data to support instructional decision-making." In other words, they would like us to use test results to decide what to do in our classroom.
Of course, part of the problem with using test data to drive instruction is that in PA, as in many states, the intellectual property interests of the test manufacturers are valued over the instructional interests of the schools, teachers, and students. Before we give the test, we all take sign an oath that we will not look at the test, and if we inadvertently see it, we will never ever reveal what we've seen or use it with our students.
When we get test results, we see, at first, raw scores. That's it. Eventually, in some years, we may see a breakdown by standards (Chris got score X for "drawing inferences"). But we will never, ever, see exactly what questions were missed by which students, or what wrong answers they chose. It is the very definition of Kafkaesque-- this student took a test and got this grade, and you must insure that the student gets a better grade next time, but you may not see any of the specifics of this test nor anything that might show you exactly where the student messed up.
You must shoot at a target in the dark. We will tell you whether you hit the target or not, but not which direction you were off. Now shoot again and do better.
It does not appear that any of that is going to be fixed. But we will get a shinier website for looking at the useless data. Yay?
The grant is also so that PIMS can be improved as a one stop shop "to expand capacity for research and evaluation by creating more open and transparent access to education data overall. Establish a state research agenda, form collaborative research partnerships and increase internal capacity to conduct research." In other words, we need to fix the things up so that we can more easily share student data with way more people.
How many tax dollars have been put behind this newly improvey initiative? Over the next four years, the state is granting $6,999,928 to this task (I really wish I could have heard the conversation in whch someone decided to hold back the $72 to make this an even seven million). I cannot wait to see what almost-seven-million buys you for a data system.
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