The unionized education hourglass has a few minutes of sand left before its upper glass chamber loses its last speck. Race to the Top and the Charter School movement have quickened the pace of the draining granules of sand. Unions can flip the hourglass to gain some time for dialogue, but only if they heed some advice.
If the union leadership continues business as usual I am worried about the integrity of our public school system. We need the union teacher movement now more than ever. I urge NEA/CTA and AFT/CFT leaders to act with foresight. The reality is the education game has changed forever. Let me demonstrate the tectonic shift we are experiencing.
This week “Waiting For Superman” is released locally, a film designed to promote dialogue about what needs to be done to improve education for all children and how some charter schools are doing it. Oprah did two shows on the film two weeks ago. This week the Huffington Post launches “HuffPost Education,” an ongoing conversation about what is wrong with America’s schools and what needs to be done to fix them.
In August the LA Times published an extensive study on how individual LAUSD teachers did on raising student scores on the state California Standards Tests in math and English. One LAUSD teacher is alleged to have taken his own life over the publication of his scores and a below- average overall rating.
Public-funded charter schools are going to continue to increase in number, especially now that they are seen as a bipartisan way to increase educational opportunity for children. At the same time we have a crisis of public education funding.
No matter what side of the political aisle you are on, charter schools will continue to siphon away money and resources from the traditional public schools, creating what author Diane Ravitch, author of “The Death and Life of the Great American School System,” calls a two-tiered system. We should all desire a system of schools that provide equal opportunity for success for all children, whether they are public-funded charters or traditional public schools.
The playing field between charter and traditional public must be equalized and that can only happen with union leaders stepping up to the plate and working with political leaders to amend tenure and seniority laws. Pay-for-performance models must be negotiated at local collective bargaining tables with unions finally believing that there are a certain group of teachers that deserve significantly higher compensation based on an objective accounting of their results, not just test scores.
Like Davis Guggenheim in “Waiting For Superman,” I have been a tireless supporter of protecting workers’ rights since my earliest days as a high school student. My father, the first progressive I knew well, was a huge supporter of the union movement. We both believed it was imperative for workers to have the legal right to organize. Unions have helped with fairness in compensation, working conditions, safety, and have given workers voice for grievances that are ignored by management.
In my late twenties I was elected as the president of my local union of 350 teachers, psychologists, and counselors. I worked tirelessly for each and every one of my union members to enjoy a contract with management that was deemed fair and just. After my 13 years as a teacher and teacher leader I became a school administrator, a member of the management team. As a principal I never had the capacity to provide those 15-25 percent of teachers who do a miraculous job of meeting the academic, social and emotional needs of all children with performance/merit pay. Rather the system of compensation as justified by the current union thinking that believes all teachers are worth the same pay based on their years of experience and education. This continued belief will destroy the union and with it our public school system.
Therefore, the time is ripe with enormous opportunities for union leaders to become the Superman or Superwoman for whom we have been waiting. If you stay really quiet you can hear the sound of the last granule of sand cascading down the glass chamber to the bottom, or the union hands picking up the vessel and turning the hourglass over for more time to dialogue.
“Rather the system of compensation as justified by the current union thinking that believes all teachers are worth the same pay based on their years of experience and education. This continued belief will destroy the union and with it our public school system.”
This is a system of “equality” that we can all do without. Not just teachers, but any unionized group that allows, no demands, that everyone be treated equally, even if they do not perform equally.
We should reward the good charters and shut down the bad charters before they do any more damage to our public funds.
http://www.leavechartersalone.com
There are great things happening in charter schools.
And we should to the same to low performing traditional schools before they do any more harm to our children
After being interviewed by the school administration, the prospective teacher said: ‘Let me see if I’ve got this right…
‘You want me to go into that room with all those kids, correct their disruptive behavior, observe them for signs of abuse, monitor their dress habits, censor their T-shirt messages, and instill in them a love for learning.
‘You want me to check their backpacks for weapons, wage war on drugs and sexually transmitted diseases, and raise their sense of self-esteem and personal pride.
‘You want me to teach them patriotism and good citizenship, sportsmanship and fair play, how to register to vote, balance a checkbook, and apply for a job.
‘You want me to check their heads for lice, recognize signs of antisocial behavior, and make sure that they all pass the final exams.
‘You also want me to provide them with an equal education regardless of their handicaps, and communicate regularly with their parents in English, Spanish or any other language, by letter, telephone, newsletter, and report card.
‘You want me to do all this with a piece of chalk, a blackboard, a bulletin board, a few books, a big smile, and a starting salary that qualifies me for food stamps.
‘You want me to do all this and then you tell me. . . . I CAN’T PRAY ??
JMO,
No doubt you are spot on. It takes an extraordinary person to teach children well. Teachers should be respected at the highest of levels by our entire society for the very good work they do each day, especially in a poorly resourced system. Those who master the difficult work by peer and management review deserve to be salaried at the superintendent level and work a full time year helping train new and experienced teachers in a coaching model.
Through a combination of incisive and prescriptive feedback by good principals with peer reviews and a cooperation from union leadership to purge those constantly not meeting professional standards we can raise the stature of one of the most important professions in this nation.
It is essential for the survival of the public schools and the health of this democracy.
” I worked tirelessly for each and every one of my union members to enjoy a contract with management that was deemed fair and just. “
and you should be thanked
Do you believe that teachers unions have worked to have ” a contract with management that was deemed fair and just. ” to students and taxpayers given the poor results in many public schools systems ?
Many parents and taxpayers believe that California public schools are failing and want ” fair and just ” changes but teacher’s union seem to fights every effort to measure results and performance and kill charter schools because they are out performing union controlled public schools
The only solution teacher’s union support is more taxes for schools
Speaking of public schools, whatever happened to that titan of public schooling wisdom, dedication and commitment to the children, the notorious Craig Mann of the notorious Santa Clara County Office of Eduction?
Recall that Mann’s intemperate rhetoric got him crosswise with his fellow solons on the SCCOE Board, and there were some harsh words and stern looks exchanged.
But recall also, that the jaded and wizened Teachable Moment knows “display behavior” in politicians when he sees it, and made a bold prediction:
> Teachable Moment Wed, Jul 28, 2010 – 2:51 pm .
> IF . . . and it’s a big if . . . IF Craig Mann’s case is ever actually brought before the SCCBOE for a vote on a motion of censure, I predict that Mann will NOT be censured.
> There is at most, two votes for censuring Mann:
> Leon Beauchman, and possibly one other.
> The remainder of the board will duck and cover, or in the case of Mann, get in the face of the majority of cowardly weenies on the board and scare them into like bunny rabbits into the tall grass..
HELLO! Was Teachable Moment right, or was he right!
Sayeth the Mercury News:
> Last month Mann received a warning but escaped board censure for sending angry e-mails critical of Weis’ hiring practices. This week, the board agreed to reconsider the proposed censure on Wednesday.
> Mann, 50, who apologized to his colleagues and Weis, admitted his criticism was “inelegant and harsh.” But he said he will persist in speaking about issues he considers important. In hiring, he said the County Office is progressing but hasn’t yet achieved “fair and equal” employment representing the county’s racial diversity. On alternative schools, he said. “I want to make sure we are offering educational programs and not just housing people.”
Ladies and Gentlemen:
In the midst of 12 percent unemployment, a crumbling economy, and a twenty billion dollar deficit, we are paying for this pointless and silly sideshow.
God help us.
Bravo, Mr. DiSalvo. Well put, indeed.
Unions demand fair treatment and guard against administrative abuse. They do not demand that incompetence be rewarded, contrary to popular media myth. The new AFT contract reflects this clearly. The union can (and I believe will) be a voice for positive change. Now if we could only divorce the educational system from the economy completely…
Raising taxes may not be the only answer, but it’s certainly a good start. In a capitalist economy, it is the only way to guarantee monies for absolute necessities like education that don’t fit the “Profit Uber Alles” model.
> Unions demand fair treatment and guard against administrative abuse.
Well, I’ll ask you the same question that I asked Joe DiSalvo (so far unanswered): what role do unions have in the public education process?
They don’t need to demand fair treatment and guard against adminstrative abuse. That’s what government is for.
The government ensures fair treatment. And, if there is adminstrative abuse, it’s because the voters WANT administrative abuse.
I’m a teacher. I work very hard, but I’m in special education; how will my work performance be evaluated vis a vis a merit pay-based format? I work with students who are multiple grade levels below in math and reading. Some of them NEVER show much progress on the standardized tests we give each spring, for a variety of reasons.
What, exactly, IS the accountability system proposed? How specifically will it measure the effectiveness of teachers? In all the furor, I must have missed the specifics. Will I be paid based on my students’ test scores? In that case, I would qualify for food stamps.
You say it’s not fair for unions to standardize wages for teachers based solely on experience and educational credit. You say it would be more just to evaluate teachers more as individuals. Well, what are the methods of evaluating teachers being proposed? Will there be differentiated methods of evaluation, or will it be a standardized system?
There are many questions left unanswered. Any ideas?
> There are many questions left unanswered. Any ideas?
Yes. Here’s an idea.
Stop listening to the self-serving fear-mongering of the government employee unions.
Their stupid idea is that everything has to be “FAIR” meaning exactly equal. In the real world, this is unachievable.
Private businesses, from small to large, are enormously resourceful in designing “performance plans” to motivate and reward their employees.
Throw out all the baloney you have heard from the teachers union and ask yourself “what would be achievable measurable accomplishments that would tell ME that I am making a positive differences as a special education teacher”?
If there ARE NO acheivable measurable accomplishments associated with your job, then your job is pointless and you should be replaced by a caretaker or a babysitter.
If there ARE acheivable measurable accomplishments associated with your job, then that would likely be the basis of your Performance Plan, and an intelligent employer would explain it to you BEFORE the fact and ask you to agree to it.
It can be done. It’s done tens of million times a year in the real world of private enterprise.
Teacherleon,
The process for performance pay will need to be negotiated at the collective bargaining table with management and union leadership. Then it will need to be voted on by a majority of the members. The only thing to fear is …
If California’s teacher unions wait much longer to begin the dialogue it might be too late and Charters will continue to increase exponentially. Remember, TL, Charters have performance pay, no tenure and very few collective bargaining agreements. Many are getting teachers who prefer to work under the reformed structure.
Please begin to understand the shifting sands of public education.
> The process for performance pay will need to be negotiated at the collective bargaining table with management and union leadership. Then it will need to be voted on by a majority of the members. The only thing to fear is …
Utterly benighted.
This is nineteenth century Marxist “us versus them” class warfare thinking.
“Union leadership” has NO role—zero, zilch, nil, nada, none—NO role in the education process.
“Union leadership” had no role in the education of Bill and Hillary Clinton’s child, no role in the education of Barack and Michelle Obama’s children, and has no role in the education of America’s children.
Joe,
Bravo – you are on your way to becoming a school choice advocate!
I now better understand your pro government schools, “Yes We Can!” beliefs.
Closer is the day when you embrace the true solution to education in America: Get the government out of the role of administering education. Fund, yes. Administer, no.
As for unions – they are fantastic for teachers who would not survive a free market in education. They have held back, and continue to hold back, all great teachers, who, in a free market, would be the object of bidding wars and earn wages commensurate with the value consumers (parents and students) place on them.
If we support school choice – the real answer being vouchers, but public charters are a good start – and we promote a true marketplace in education, with schools competing with one another for students… some school will say “You know that Di Salvo guy? He’s brilliant and our parents and kids would really benefit from us having him at our school. Let’s offer him 25k more per year than whatever he’s making now.”
I’m in it for you Joe, I’m in your corner. One of these days you will join me. Yes we can!!!
All the best,
Bob
> Joe,
> Bravo – you are on your way to becoming a school choice advocate!
Bob:
Curb your enthusiasm.
At the rate that Joe is inching in the direction of being a school choice advocate, it will be the twenty-fifth century before he will admit the possibility that public education might possible without a covert government monopoly. (“Charter schools” are just public schools where the big government party figured out that they had to put a smiley face on their iron-fisted control.)
Teachable,
Baby steps. I don’t expect life-long government monopoly on schools believers to become Geoffrey Canada (see Waiting for Superman or The Lottery if you don’t know who Geoffrey Canada is) over night. But if good people like Joe can simply start giving competition a chance, start giving charters a chance, we will all benefit.
Like convincing the Chinese government to allow the free-market to do it’s thing. Even small doses are better than none.