Posts
My niece had a terrific algebra teacher freshman year. Scratch that: my niece had a terrific algebra teacher fall semester. Her school is on block scheduling so by January she was done with math for the next 9 months. Won’t take math again until the fall.
Here’s how he ran his class.
Every week his students have 3 chances to take a test on that week’s material. The test is short, perhaps 5 key problems. If they ace it the first time, they’re done. If they don’t ace it, they take it again; if they don’t ace it the second time, they take it one last time. The final grade stands.
The cool thing: the tests are cumulative.
The first week students take a test on the the first 5 problems; the second week students take a test on those five problems along with the next five problems; the third week they take a test on the first week’s 5 problems, the second week’s 5 problems, and the 3rd week’s 5 problems, and so on.
By the end of the semester they’ve worked up to a final exam covering everything they’ve learned in the course, which they remember because they’ve been re-tested on it every week of the semester.
The teacher also sends each parent a weekly email laying out in detail his child’s progress in the course. Parents can see whether or not their child mastered that week’s material, and they can see when he mastered it: 1st test, 2nd test, or 3rd. Parents can also see any set of 3 tests where his child did not master the material even with three tries. My sister says you could glance at the email and see exactly which material your kid barely squeaked by on.
The teacher explained his system on Back to School night and told parents not to panic when they got the initial emails because early on in the year the point total could suddenly drop 50 points when a student blew the first or second test. He told parents not to panic & not to yell at their kids because they’d have two more chances.
The emails don’t function as a veiled request for parents to kick in with reteaching and tutoring. They are information. Parents know what their kids are doing in the course. I assume that his emails do function as an invitation for parents to kick in with oversight and homework monitoring. Which is fine by me. Parents of students in his class know exactly what they need to know to manage the situation at home.
This may be especially important in my sister’s school because some kids intentionally blow off the class due to a complicated CA system whereby they get credit for “Math 1” even if they flunk Algebra 1. My sister and I agree that the problem these kids pose is school level, not teacher level. In my view (not necessarily my sister’s) the school needs to kick in with supervised homework sessions and the like. (See: LaSalle High School.) Working in a system that rewards kids for flunking algebra, this teacher deals with it by making sure parents know their kids have decided to flunk algebra, providing them with a weekly update on just how much algebra their kids have flunked to date.
The teacher is available every lunch hour and frequently after school for Extra Help. And: Extra Help actually helps. My niece went in twice when she wasn’t getting something. The reason she knew she wasn’t getting it was that she had barely squeaked by on the first two tests and still came up with a low score on the 3rd test.
She went for Extra Help after the 2nd test. My sister says the 3-test format taps into the Magic Number 3 that is embedded in the hearts and minds of children everywhere, as in: “I’m going to count to 3 and when I get to 3 you better be factoring trinomials or else.”
Clearly, the three tests serve as formative assessment. The teacher knows, the student know, and the parent knows whether the kid has or has not mastered the material covered in the course to date. That doesn’t happen in a normal math class. In a normal math class, as my sister points out, “Since no one grades homework, you don’t find out if they know anything until they flunk the test.”
This math class is far from normal because, as it turns out—and this came as a surprise—this teacher also grades homework. The way my sister and my niece found that out was that one day my niece blew off her homework: she just wrote down whatever came to mind and turned it in.
The homework came back with an “F” on top. The teacher had read her homework, corrected her homework, and graded her homework.
She went to see him and apologized. It had been years since a teacher had so much as looked at her homework and she’d assumed he wasn’t going to look at it, either. She asked if she could do it over again & the teacher said yes.
It will probably come as no surprise to learn that the homework sets weren’t burdensome. Perhaps because this teacher read and graded all the homework, or perhaps because he knew exactly how much homework the kids needed in order to master the concepts, he gave small problem sets. My other niece, whose teachers never so much as glanced at anything the kids did outside class, would be assigned dozens of problems every night; she’d sit and slave over her math and no one at the school would give it a second thought. As a result, the stuff they turned in was “the crappiest sh** you’ve ever seen.”
The kids in this teacher’s class, because their teacher was a collecter and correcter, learned to produce neat, readable solution set with the answers circled.
So:
I would put money on it the kids in this man’s class have some of the highest math achievement coming out of a public school Algebra 1 course in the country.
They better have, since it'll be 9 long months before any of them looks at the inside of a math book again.
the Gambill method
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
59 comments:
Can we clone him? What a shame that the students don't benefit for longer than a term. That is one fabulous teacher.
Wow! I am salivating for a teacher like this in our high school.
I just learned that collecting and correcting homework seems to be rare in our high school. The teachers don’t have time for that. I guess the thinking is that it’s more important to prepare these kids for college-style coursework than to help them master college prep math. My quick take on this is that our school is fine for the “math brains”, but does little for those students lacking “natural ability”.
BTW, these methods seem very boy-friendly.
I might also add that this is the only teacher my daughter is going to miss when she drops out of highs school and heads to JC. She had planned out her math education around what semesters he taught. He had also tipped her off as to which teachers’ classes to take when he wasn’t teaching a particular course.
This guy is amazing.
Ros didn't tell me about the fact that he COLLECTS & CORRECTS HOMEWORK til well into our conversation -- I just about plotzed.
I'd love to see his results stacked up against everyone else's.
Of course it's horrifying the kids don't have him for the whole year.
I'd be willing to bet, though, that this is the most effective teaching in a block format out there.
I wonder if the homework correction ALONG WITH THE CONSTANT FORMATIVE ASSESSMENT is necessary because of the very short timeline.
My assumption, after reading about Gambill's approach, has been that if you're doing a lot of formative assessment you don't need also to correct all the homework.
otoh, Gambill has a system of daily formative assessment that this teacher isn't using.
It may be six of one, half-dozen of the other.
(Actually, as I think about it, Gambill's formative assessment is to have the kids do the 2 or 3 hardest problems from the homework set --- do I remember that right?)
My quick take on this is that our school is fine for the “math brains”, but does little for those students lacking “natural ability”.
This is what we see here.
Everything is based on the "naturals."
And it's true: the Naturals don't need their homework corrected. They can look at something one time on a board and get it.
That's why we call them Naturals.
The height of the math battle last year came when the math chair was telling parents (not just us - other parents, too) that the kids should have done fine on a test many had flunked because "They saw this material last year."
I think CT Parent is on to something here. This teacher's system seems less dependent on his individual charisma than it does on his organization and diligence. Which means it can be codified, analyzed, and improved systematically (which I suspect is exactly what this individual teacher has done over the years).
This leads to the question: has anyone attempted to replicate it? If not, why not?
I suspect it goes back to the teachers-as-artists vs. teachers-as-professionals debate. For an artist, mimicking somebody else's style is an affront; for a professional, it's just plain good business practice. I've observed that most teachers tend perceive themselves more as artists than as professionals, despite the many pleas to the contrary.
Independent George raises a question I have. Although schools will select a curriculum like Everyday Math, how much leeway (typically) do schools give teachers? My son's fifth grade math teacher didn't get to 35 percent of the material in the course. That might be fine, but she just went along sequentially and stopped when time ran out. Then she sent a letter home saying that she was pleased at how everyone's critical thinking had improved. This year, my son is doing coloring of science terms. I believe that the teacher has been doing this for ages.
My impression is that each teacher is in their own little world. They might get some curriculum guidelines, but all of the details are left up to them. I can't say that I would like to be micromanaged, but there appears to me no mechanism for judging the quality of their teaching. State tests help, but they will never guarantee that kids will be properly prepared for algebra in any grade. Perhaps they seem to be artists because they refuse to quantify exactly what they are doing. All art is good by definition.
I ran into this with our state testing. My son did fine, but not great, on the reading comprehension part of the test, even though he has top marks at school in language arts. The test is based on answering questions about short passages. My son says that they NEVER do this in class. It seems that the teacher really doesn't like to take a direct approach to the problem. Perhaps she doesn't think this approach leads to real understanding, so she is taking the artistic(?) indirect route. It isn't working. Since they are doing a lot of coloring and diorama work, she seems to be taking a very indirect route.
Yes, I think artist is a good analogy.
By the way, do union contracts have wording about control or limits over what goes on in the classroom?
In my limited experience interacting with math teachers in public high schools in Oakland, CA, they could not change the textbook, they could not discipline students, they could not remove students from their classes, they could not assign homework.
But when it came to presentation, style of grading, or lesson plans, they had complete control. So, basically, it was the worst of all worlds. no enforcement of standards in anything like the notion of a teaching PROFESSION, and no autonomy to control the classroom in any other way.
>>My impression is that each teacher is in their own little world
That's how it was here until NCLB. After yearly state testing for Gr. 3-8 came in, the school was reorganized. Grade level chairpersons were appointed and charged with making sure each section covered the material listed in the NY State 2005 Math Core Curriculum. Resource teachers were hired and small classrooms built to remediate all elementary children scoring below proficiency, including non-classified children. Middle school students not acheiving proficiency on state testing were placed into double period math classes and given remediation. High school students gained an additional option of taking Regents Math A as a 2 period course, with the second period being remediation and lab. This is the second year of this course of action, so the results are not in yet.
>>By the way, do union contracts have wording about control or limits over what goes on in the classroom?
Possibly. I would love to see a copy to know if it is the principal or teachers blowing smoke. In our case, elementary parents of '3's and '4's have been told that parents are responsible for remediation, not classroom teachers. PTA officers have heard several stories of children missing major concepts (some short illness not qualifying for homebound tutor remediation, sometimes student just plain didn't understand) and teachers saying they cannot re-teach in the classroom and child is not eligible for resource help.
there appears to me no mechanism for judging the quality of their teaching
In all likelihood there is none.
We were told, explicitly, at the Board Candidate's debate, that our teacher have never been evaluated.
They have had classroom visits by administrators & reports have been written, but they have not been evaluated.
No teacher here has ever been evaluated, tenured, or promoted on the basis of demonstrated ability to affect student achievement.
In fact, I know of at least one case in which a superb teacher was demoted from the high school to the middle school.
The district didn't use the term "demotion." However, the teacher was unhappy about the transfer as were all of her h.s. students.
Our union contract specifies that student evaluations cannot be considered in making tenure decisions.
Nor can comments from parents be placed in a teacher's file unless the teacher wishes the parent's comments to be placed there.
Nothing can be placed in a teacher's file without the teacher's consent.
caveat: It's possible the superintendent has some authority to put things in a teacher's file without permission....but my memory is that the teacher has final say.
This is all in the contract.
It has been quite some time since I have added to this blog, but I feel it necessary to provide input.
It is quite incorrect that nothing can be placed in a teacher's file without his consent. The signature of an evaluative tool only signifies that the teacher has seen the report, not that he agrees with its content.
At the building level, an administrator may keep whatever he likes in his personal personnel file. The superintendent's file can only be populated with official documents that create the official record. Since parents, students, custodians, and anyone else who is not in a supervisory position are not involved in formal evaluations, their input has no place in a formal file.
But do not think for a moment that the school does not take into serious consideration the concerns of all invested parties, especially when it comes to the granting of tenure, which has changed greatly, for many reasons, over the last few years.
Remember, the union, for all of the issues that many people have with it, exists not to hinder the education of students or to keep out the community, but to allow teachers to bargain collectively for working conditions and compensation.
There are volumes more, from multiple perspectives, to be written about this topic, but I'll end here because the last thing I want to do is appear to be a troll who is out to inflame. I simply want to set the record straight, through a contractual lens, about what appropriately belongs in a teacher's formal file.
Happy blogging,
Parents, btw, have a right under FERPA to read their children's file and to challenge items in those files.
I'm going to request that the school remove two canned comments from C's file:
"Finds subject matter difficult" (6th grade math teacher)
"Inferential thinking needs imp" (science teacher)
These are from the 2 weakest teachers C has had in his 9 years here in Irvington.
Needless to say, union contract specifies that I can't say the same of them.
It is quite incorrect that nothing can be placed in a teacher's file without his consent. The signature of an evaluative tool only signifies that the teacher has seen the report, not that he agrees with its content.
Is that true?
Interesting.
We were told - in a board meeting - that the teacher must approve.
But we could have that wrong.
We were also told that there are, in essence, no evaluations of teachers in any of the files. Yes, there are evaluation forms. But the evaluations are pro forma.
This statement was made and recorded on video at the board forum, so I know I've got that right!
Parent comments are kept in a separate file maintained by the superintendent's assistant.
Last but not least, a number of parents here have repeatedly asked how and in what way student achievement is considered in tenure cases.
The answer is that no objective measures of student achievement are taken or considered when tenure decisions are made.
Remember, the union, for all of the issues that many people have with it, exists not to hinder the education of students or to keep out the community, but to allow teachers to bargain collectively for working conditions and compensation.
That's certainly true.
However, in the case of my own district the union contract specifies that middle school teachers are not required to hold parent-teacher conferences. (I assume the same is true of high school teachers, but I don't know.)
Practically speaking, that is a case of the union keeping the community out although that is not the union's mission, of course.
But do not think for a moment that the school does not take into serious consideration the concerns of all invested parties, especially when it comes to the granting of tenure, which has changed greatly, for many reasons, over the last few years.
I know that this is the view of the administration and board.
It simply can't be the view of parents because it is not our experience, nor is it what we have been told by our superintendent.
The superintendent has been clear on the question of tenure: the district goal in all cases is to award tenure if humanly possible.
New teachers are mentored and supported to succeed. The first 3 years on the job are not a "trial period"; the first 3 years are a period of mentoring and support.
And, indeed, a very large percentage of new teachers are tenured.
By the way, do union contracts have wording about control or limits over what goes on in the classroom?
Boy, I don't think so.
That's why Bloomberg & c. were able to micromanage classrooms.
>>My impression is that each teacher is in their own little world. They might get some curriculum guidelines, but all of the details are left up to them.<<
This has been the case in the three schools I've taught in. No consistency, no alignment, no common usage of best practices, etc.
I feel your comments on the union are reactionary. Remember it is not the union's contract. It is a bargained agreement between the faculty and the school board, who are acting as agents of their constituents.
The union does not have the power to demand changes to a contract. This means that any benefit the faculty has negotiated has come at a cost. Likewise, anything the district gained has come through some sort of bargain. Negotiating a contract is not about making demands, but about compromise and concession.
Almost anything the community wants in the contract, with the exception of a few items taken off the table through state law (which impacts both sides of the table), can be negotiated. It is simply a matter of prioritizing needs and determining what you are prepared to give up for the gains you would like to see.
You can imagine faculty members wanting a ten percent raise in each year of the new contract. It seems like an impossible desire, but it could probably be achieved by exceeding the districts wishlist at the negotiating table. The faculty could wind up washing everyone in Irvington's car once a week (I used something crazy not to suggest this might happen, but for hyperbole), but none of them would agree to that, so salary increases remain reasonable.
The curricular points of KTM have matured tremendously since I began watching this site and I never feel insulted by your positions on how schools should be run or classes should be taught, but I beg you to consider your position on the teacher's union.
If you wish to criticize the contract, I hope that you can call it the district's contract so that all the players involved are indicted.
If not, I feel you minimize the impacts of your efforts to bring about reform by singularly crediting flaws you perceive in a bargained agreement.
Again, I do not wish to stir the pot here. While I don't agree with some of your views, I feel what you do is respectable. I am only chiming in to hopefully educate the readership of this blog on the mechanics of contract execution and negotiation.
Don't think I am rude if I don't respond to further posts. I have to go make dinner.
"If you wish to criticize the contract, I hope that you can call it the district's contract so that all the players involved are indicted."
I'm sure that the last word here is a typo. But I can't figure out what the word should be. Anyone?
[No, I'm not trying to be snarky ... I'm trying to follow this thread.]
-Mark Roulo
Parents in Irvington need only make a call or send an e-mail to meet with a teacher, team, principal or an administrator. I have found that to be far more helpful than a teacher conference in MS or HS. Everyone is extremely accessible. You should be able to attest to that. According to your blog, you've had plenty of meetings. By the way, transcripts show grades not comments.
If you wish to criticize the contract, I hope that you can call it the district's contract so that all the players involved are indicted.
Absolutely.
I should be more clear: I don't fault the union for negotiating as hard and as well as it possibly can.
That is the union's job.
This is absolutely the district's contract.
No question.
Parents in Irvington need only make a call or send an e-mail to meet with a teacher, team, principal or an administrator.
Here is the problem with the system as it stands. It results in the majority of contact between parents and the school being negative.
I've sent numerous friendly, positive emails to middle school teachers over the years.
If I rounded them all up and counted, I think I'd find that the majority of these emails were not answered or even acknowledged.
Other parents have had the same experience.
Teachers seem almost to have a policy of ignoring emails unless the email raises a problem. Of course a lot of us wonder whether there is such a policy in place; we've all heard that the superintendent monitors teacher's emails.
I have no idea whether that's true. But the fact that such rumors circulate is evidence that the system, as it stands, is problematic.
As to whether regularly scheduled parent-teacher meetings would be helpful, I don't see why they would be any less helpful than the regularly scheduled parent-teacher meetings held in K-5.
Do you really want to meet for 5-10 minutes with the English, Spanish/French/Latin, Math, Gym, Art, Health, etc teacher, or do you want to meet with a specific teacher or teachers? Assuming conferences would be scheduled before or after school, chances are I would have met with who I needed to meet with long before I had a scheduled conference. I for one do not want my HS student to miss a half day of school severa times a year for conferences.
Teachers and administrators have always answered my e-mails and my friends e-mails. But then again, we don't post them on a blog.
I'd love to meet with them!
I hope that you can call it the district's contract so that all the players involved are indicted."
That is kind of funny.
This leads to the question: has anyone attempted to replicate it? If not, why not?
This is the "professional learning communities" idea, which I believe our district is trying to implement.
The idea is to have teachers collaborate and meet frequently, etc., so that they can share what's working & what's not working, etc.
This is one of the major "school improvement" concepts out there at the moment, or so I gather.
"Professional learning communities" are also connected to the idea of "continuous improvement" which I think comes from Japan (Kaizen??)
I tend to think "PLCs" aren't going to work, but I'll be interested to hear what teachers have to say.
I feel your comments on the union are reactionary.
Not to get to off topic, but in modern western societies I think it's the unions that tend to be reactionary, in the sense of resistant to change.
Megan McArdle had a nice post today on the topic:
I know that my liberal friends and readers think of me as a union basher who just can't stand the thought of workers claiming a bigger share of the pie. I'm actually not particularly anti-union, and to the extent that I do have problems with unions, it is not because they seek higher wages and benefits for their members. Rather, it is because they introduce serious structural rigidities into the economy.
"Remember, the union, for all of the issues that many people have with it, exists not to hinder the education of students ..."
"hinder"? I can't comment about Irvington, but there are definite union tradeoffs regarding student education in our parts that are directly related to seniority and hiring. We had a seniority-based chain-reaction bumping a few years ago that mixed up 6 teachers in our lower school. Parents were extremely pissed off, but there was nothing that could be done.
And then there was a time when I was on a parent-teacher committee where certain parental requests (that amounted to about 10 extra minutes at the end of the day for a few teachers) were shot down because they "won't fly contracturally".
As for contracts being reached on an equitable basis, this doesn't work for small districts (towns) like ours. In fact, our school committee complains that they do not have the skills, legal backing, or historical continuity (school committee members are unpaid and only on the board for a few years) to do a proper job against a well-prepared state-supported union. There was some talk about state-wide contracts, but that has its own issues. Union contracts in our area are definitely not hammered out on an equal footing.
Then there is the problem of equating education directly with money during contract talks. Even many parents equate smaller budgets (or rather, smaller increases) with less educational opportunities, but they don't know where the money is going. In this very simplistic view, discussions of real educational improvements get lost.
So, I've heard this defense of union contracts before; that they are negotiated by two equal sides. However, it is untrue to say that there are no educational trade-offs. The really unequal party of this arrangement are the parents. They have no choice, and no, voting for different school committee members is not the same thing. Parents need the power to take the money and go elsewhere.
I can think of a few cases where the union has directly hindered the education of children. I just went through an experience where a teacher was trying to give more to her students but was reprimanded for "setting a precedent." I can't go into the details right now, but thank goodness, she ignored them.
Teachers who check their watches and leave meetings that the principal calls is another example of union interference. I doubt there are many jobs where you can get up and walk out when your superior is talking to you. You certainly wouldn't be called a professional.
Susan
"I doubt there are many jobs where you can get up and walk out when your superior is talking to you. You certainly wouldn't be called a professional."
This reminds me of the first professional job I ever had. Within the first two weeks, my boss called me into his office to go over what I had been assigned. It was late afternoon and the meeting went well past normal stopping time. I figured out very quickly that it was a test. I didn't look at the clock once. About an hour later, after most people had left, my boss looked at his watch, acted surprised, and asked me if I had a car pool to catch. Right.
"Professional learning communities are also connected to the idea of continuous improvement which I think comes from Japan (Kaizen??)"
Garbage In, Garbage Out. The very large corporation where my wife works has a Kaizen program going on now. It makes management think that they are doing something real. In reality, the changes are only small suggestions that make the employee look good, but saves the company only a minuscule fraction of their costs. They could continue this for a thousand years and it won't amount to a hill of beans. But hey! They are doing Kaizen.
Unfortunately, employees are afraid to suggest any change that is anything more than trivial. Kaizen doesn't fix structural problems, especially those that have to do with the assumptions or opinions of those in charge.
When talking with teachers, I've noticed a particular disconnect between what they perceive what being treated as a professional means, and what actually happens in the professions. More often than not, I've noticed that when teachers talk about wanting to be treated as professionals, they tend to view it as an almost imperial privilege; what they overlook is that teachers-as-professionals necessarily means that the parents become clients.
Personally, while I think that such a relationship benefits everyone, but it's a dramatically different model than what most teachers imagine.
I'd also hasten to add that I don't think unions are themselves inimical to professionalism, but I do think that it means a drastic change to how schools are structured. Specifically, it means switching from the industrial model, into an entreprenurial model.
For example, plumbers, electricians, and carpenters are all unionized, but they're also professionals who are accountable to their clients, and are able to compete effectively with their cheaper non-union counterparts on the basis of quality. When I talk about school choice, it's not just parents being able to choose schools, but teachers, too. In most districts, the seniority, tenure, and pension rules severely limit a teacher's ability to change jobs.
Actually, I think the best comparison for the idealized teacher's union I have in my head is the MLB Players' Association. Turn teachers into free agents, parents into paying fans, and everybody wins. (I think a lot of the KTM regulars are already filling the Bill James role admirably, and have already locked horns with the Joe Morgans of the education world on numerous occasions).
Mark, I think perhaps "indicted" should be "indicated."
"If you wish to criticize the contract, I hope that you can call it the district's contract so that all the players involved are indicted."
VickyS,
Thanks for the suggestion. I considered 'indicated' because it is fairly close to indicted. But "all the players involved are indicated" ?
This makes sense if the idea is to move the label so that the district "owns" the contract.
Hmmmm ... okay. Since we are criticizing the contract, moving the ownership from the union to the district makes sense.
-Thanks,
Mark Roulo
I just assumed it was supposed to read "not" indicted as is "so that all the players are not idicted." I do that kind of stuff, much to my frustration upon reading it afterward.
Geez! See, I did it again. I should have said as in not as is...
Goodnight folks!
Mark, I agree, "indicated" does not exactly fit, either.
Perhaps:
"If you wish to criticize the contract, I hope that you can call it the district's contract (too?) so that all the players involved are indicted (indicated?)."
Seems we need to hear from the original poster!
What is the problem with indicted? Unless my command of English is slipping, it should be clear that I imply the trade union and the community bear the responsibilty for any accusations (informal, in a legal sense, as they may be).
I am actually annoyed by some of the commenters who took this thread off task. So many of the KTM arguments against other posters in the past have challenged rhetorical techniques, yet I find my post attacked with mostly rhetorical legerdemain.
I am a teacher and I do not see myself as a professional. I am a trade unionist who has to fight almost daily to maintain his quality of life. Many of us do our best to perform professionally, but we are not professionals in the denotative sense of the word.
Someone spoke about the teachers who walked out of a meeting.
I ask of you all- Should a teacher work five minutes beyond his contract? Ten minutes? What about an hour? Should that teacher stay until 5:30 if the meeting doesn't end? What about 8:30? Where do you draw the line?
Teachers are civil employees who straddle the line between blue collar labor and an intellectual caste.
We are certainly not professional because we cannot legally establish our own practices or dictate our own compensation or working conditions.
Another comment complained about precedent dictating what teachers would do. Once a precedent has been set it takes precedence and become legally binding (simplified for brevity, but essentially true). Changes in working conditions need to be negotiated. No school district ever decided to pay its teachers extra money outside of the contract that it would have to pay in perpetuity. Why would you expect the employees of the school district to work extra, in essence for free (and therefore at a loss) without negotiating these conditions?
Not all of the comments I read today were disturbing, but I felt the general tone was very different from the one I established in my initial posts.
Lastly, there have been several anonymous posters in this thread. Only two have been from me.
Look to my diction to figure out which ones (if you care), but for the purpose of clarification I will call myself TPV when posting on KTM from now on.
-TPV
Despite getting sidetracked by the word, there were lots of other comments and arguments that were quite proper. You can't dismiss those so easily. This is what you wrote originally.
"Remember, the union, for all of the issues that many people have with it, exists not to hinder the education of students or to keep out the community, but to allow teachers to bargain collectively for working conditions and compensation."
Many examples of union rules "hindering" education were presented. Generally, I don't care one way or another about unions, but in this case, I can't take my money and go elsewhere.
"I am a trade unionist who has to fight almost daily to maintain his quality of life."
You can't throw this out without support. You could say this is true for lots of jobs, professional or otherwise.
"Should a teacher work five minutes beyond his contract? Ten minutes? What about an hour? Should that teacher stay until 5:30 if the meeting doesn't end? What about 8:30? Where do you draw the line?"
It's a sad state of affairs when you have to negotiate down to the minute. Most teachers work more than the minimum specified in the contract, so what's the problem? Most salaried professionals work far more than 40 hours per week. If they don't like the work or compensation, they get a new job. Teachers should try it. Supply and demand benefit good workers.
"We are certainly not professional because we cannot legally establish our own practices or dictate our own compensation or working conditions."
I'm a professional engineer (PE), but there is nothing that allows me to "dictate" my own compensation or working conditions. I'm not sure what you are talking about. This sounds like another example of a teacher not having a clue about what goes on in the real world. It's not some sort of magic fairyland out there for "professionals".
"Why would you expect the employees of the school district to work extra, in essence for free (and therefore at a loss) without negotiating these conditions?"
Because it's the professional thing to do?
---SteveH said
---I'm a professional engineer (PE), but there is nothing that allows me to "dictate" my own compensation or working conditions.
in reponse to this:--We are certainly not professional because we cannot legally establish our own practices or dictate our own compensation or working conditions."
No, TPV is right, and you incorrect, to the extent that TPV is speaking of public school teachers. You negotiate your own pay and working conditions. You dictate them by saying "yes" or "no". You have the right to say no and walk away. You get to bargain for yourself. I assume your point was "but I can't ask for the moon, because everyone will say 'no'" but teachers can't ask for their own anything--they get what the union and the district negotiate for them. You can put out a shingle and say "I charge $180 an hour" and if that's the market rate for your skills, you'll get it. They can't. You can negotiate what tools you work with and be supplied them by your employer. That is, you can demand better tools and receive them--even different ones than your colleagues have. You can walk away from your corporation or employer at will, they can't. You can get a bonus one year without that meaning someone else does. They can't. You can tell clients how they should contact you, interact with you, or approach you. They can't. You can establish yourself based on your professional license as determined by an outside entity--the state or province or NCEES, etc. They can't.
And certainly, the part you glossed over, about how they cannot legally establish their own practices is the real problem. Board certification in medicine and law means something; censure by such boards means something. Self governance is a vital part of a profession, and teachers don't have it at all. They have no structure by which to censure one of their own, promote one of their own, revamp their own licensing to acknowledge current necessary skills, experience, knowledge.
But, the bast majority of the reasons why are because the teachers don't want to. They could create such self governance and walk away from the unions anytime they wanted to. It wouldn't be easy, but it's possible. But it would be risky.
---Most salaried professionals work far more than 40 hours per week.
That wasn't the point. The point was: they aren't professionals. Yes, professionals often work much more than 40 hours a week. Do you understand the difference between the categorization of exempt and non exempt employees? Basically, executive, supervisory, professional or outside sales positions are exempt positions. Teachers are none of those. They ARE NOT PROFESSIONALS.
--If they don't like the work or compensation, they get a new job. Teachers should try it. Supply and demand benefit good workers.
But how would they at a public school? They have NO RIGHT to negotiate their own work or compensation--it's up to the UNION and the DISTRICT. That's the point being made.
I'm not defending the system; I'm trying to point out how far it is from the kind of world in which a professional such as an engineer works.
Let me try one more point:
Do you expect nonexempt workers to work extra without pay? That's illegal. Teacher are essentially nonexempt workers. Why? Because being exempt means working until the job is done, not a certain number of hours. What job would that be for teachers?
We already know it isn't the job of "making sure all students in my classroom can read/write/do arithmetic/score above a certain percentage on all tests."
that's NOT what teachers think they are for. They don't understand their job to mean they have that kind of criterion related to their own success.
They are essentially nonexempt workers, paid for their time, who should be told what to do and how to do it, though that part is often lacking in how the district handles things.
I'm not sure the comments about teachers being non-exempt are correct. Fact sheet #17D form the US Department of Labor states:
Teachers
Teachers are exempt if their primary duty is teaching, tutoring, instructing or lecturing in the activity of imparting knowledge, and if they are employed and engaged in this activity as a teacher in an educational establishment. Exempt teachers include, but are not limited to, regular academic teachers; kindergarten or nursery school teachers; teachers of gifted or disabled children; teachers of skilled and semi-skilled trades and occupations; teachers engaged in automobile driving instruction; aircraft flight instructors; home economics teachers; and vocal or instrument music teachers. The salary and salary basis requirements do not apply to bona fide teachers. Having a primary duty of teaching, tutoring, instructing or lecturing in the activity of imparting knowledge includes, by its very nature, exercising discretion and judgment (emphasis added).
This is more the way I view teachers. I guess I do see them as professionals in that sense. I'm no expert in labor law but I wouldn't think that a union could negotiate a change in the Department of Labor rules. Am I wrong?
"But, the bast majority of the reasons why are because the teachers don't want to."
That was my whole point. I wasn't talking about individual teachers. They seem to want it both ways. They want the protection of the union, but they also want the benefits of supply and demand without the risk. So what happens? Parents get no supply and no choice.
"Do you understand the difference between the categorization of exempt and non exempt employees?"
Yes, and teachers don't punch the clock. They see themselves as professionals, they are on salary, and they know that they should put in more than the minimum number of hours per day, although that's less than 8 hours per day.
An individual teacher can feel like a victim, but I'm not talking about individual teachers. As I've said before, many teachers feel that the problems of education are what they see walking in the classroom and their own working conditions. it's a very self-centered view of education.
"They are essentially nonexempt workers, paid for their time, who should be told what to do and how to do it, though that part is often lacking in how the district handles things."
Most salaried professionals are told what to do and how to do it. They might have a lot of technical expertise, but that doesn't mean that they do what they want. Most professionals don't work for themselves.
My concern is when union rules get in the way of education. Unions like to think that there are no trade-offs. They like to focus on things like smaller class size and more money because that benefits teachers too. They hope we won't pay attention to the other details. Many really hate it when the contracts get posted online.
That wasn't the point. The point was: they aren't professionals.
Wait, I'm a little confused. I thought that was the point.
Every teacher I've ever spoken to thinks of themself as a dedicated professional, definitely not a "non exempt worker."
Actor and musician unions also have strict negotiated time rules, but there are a couple of differences. Both follow a script to the letter and cannot do whatever they want and still be protected by the union.
An actor can be fired simply because the director doesn't think he's working out. So, the union may not make them work without pay, but they had better not show up unprepared.
Susan
Uh, himself, not "themself."
I need more coffee...
Susan
This is an interesting discussion. The variety of experiences reported are reflective of the fact that conditions are extremely variable, by state, district and locality.
Are teachers "professionals"? It depends. In some legislation, teaching is defined as a profession and certain "professional standards" are expected and may be enforced. So, teachers may use the term "professional" in a loose sense (I do this myself) while not subscribing to any illusion that teaching is a "profession" like dentistry, medicine, engineering, etc.
As TPV pointed out, teachers are not "professionals" in most situations; they are fairly low-level salaried employees, who do not make any of the critical decisions regarding their "practice." Many districts have very strict curriculum guides, pacing schedules, "curriculum police," and require teachers to plan specific activities using designated materials, right down to the minute, and regardless of the needs or presenting problems of the students they teach.
Bloomberg's NYC is one example of a micro-managed system; PA and CA have others, and so do many states. A comparison with medicine can be instructive. An intern, or young doctor in a family practice clinic for instance, will have little "independence" but he will be called upon to use his training to make numerous treatment decisions, and he will have had to demonstrate his competence in applying his knowledge clinically in both examinations and practicum licensing requirements. There is a recognized body of knowledge and skills in medicine (and most other so-called professions) that individuals must demonstrate the ability to apply before they can be licensed.
No such strictures apply in teaching; indeed, no established body of scientific or empirical knowledge is even recognized to exist (even though it does). Attitudes, beliefs and seat-time are deemed preparation for teaching.
ANother difference: a young doctor doing a residency in emergency medicine, say, will not be expected to purchase his own X-ray machines, MRI's, swabs and sutures, et alia, and bring all these along with him to work. The public rarely hears about this, but teachers are put in this position frequently. Various studies have researched how much of their own money elementary teachers spend on classroom materials; it ranges from $500 to $5000 per year . Few teachers get a classroom budget of $500 per year, but many find themselves in the position of having NO materials of any kind to use with their students. Sounds like the third world, but classrooms with rats scurrying about, holes in the ceiling, no books or paper or A-V equipment etc. do exist.You just don't hear about it.
I've taught in such situations (only miles from well-supplied, manicured "middle class" schools) and know of plenty of others in districts like Detroit and Chicago. Now, a doctor in private practice -- a business person -- has to purchase his own "stuff," but the junior resident or "employee" doctor does not have to do this. The employer is supposed to supply the tools for the job. Certainly, the public THINKS this is happening. The reality check, folks, is that often it is not. That textbook or supply money is allocated -- and where does it go? Not to the schools with vulnerable populations and parents who are not sufficiently political too agitate and raise ****.
So, teachers do not have professional training, licensing, or working conditions. Unionization is a reaction to a problem, and absence of unions does not seem to cause leaps in student achievement. Don't take my word for it -- check out which states are non-union (there are quite a few) and see if they have enviable student achievement. I already did, and know the answer;-) I wouldn't work in a non-unionized public system because the system is not only set up to prevent the kids from excelling, but to prevent teachers from enabling kids to excel. At least a union can protect ME against administrative bullies -- or, in my younger days, sexual harassment (this used to be flagrant and offensive. Remember that most elementary teachers are female, and most administrators male, and you can see trouble brewing. I could tell some stories that would curl your hair.) Lawsuits and union action have tamed down some rogue admins with wandering hands and other body parts.
However, the management rights in our contract prevent the kinds of abuses that some here have reported. Teachers must work after school hours -- attending meetings, PD sessions, etc. (weekends can also be required). Sufficient notice must be given, but salaried employees are not hourly workers, and are paid to do the JOB, which requires considerable time beyond the hours in class. A teacher who looked at his/her watch and walked out of a meeting with the principal or parent would be disciplined (an emergency, such as a family member being rushed to the hospital, would be a different matter). Management must give employees notice of meetings and so on, but then the employees must also be there, or suffer penalties.
As for teacher "professionalism," the articles below make some good points:
Carnine on effective practice
and
Why Teaching Is Not A Research-Based Profession
I don't think that anyone feels that unions are "the" problem; just that there are trade-offs being made. In my son's former (non-union) private school, they used Everyday Math and assumed that parents made sure that learning took place. They looked good because they were teaching good kids with involved parents.
Generally, KTM stays away from union issues, but they are not off-the-table. You can't just point to the good parts of a union contract and ignore the bad ones.
And professionalism doesn't solve all problems. As I said, it's not a fairyland out there. Most companies do not require workers to buy materials, but they expect them to get the job done without needed human resources. People get laid off, but the workload doesn't decrease. There can be incredible stress.
Professionals might have licensing and other requirements, but that doesn't protect them from lawsuits. Teachers are mistaken if they think that there is some magic professional status that will make everything OK.
Most of the issues raised at KTM have little to do with unions and any sort of definition of professionalism. They have to do with different ideas of what constitutes a proper education for the individual and/or the group, and the fact that parents have no part in these decisions.
Steve H said:
They have to do with different ideas of what constitutes a proper education for the individual and/or the group, and the fact that parents have no part in these decisions
Exactly. Parents have no part -- and neither do teachers. The education world is run by a small inner circle that is not responsive either to its employees or to its supposed clientele. You guys really MUST read Cathy Watkins book on how this works (and how to change it -- more to the point).
I say, Bring on school choice -- then I too could choose to be at a school that emphasized strong academic learning for all students, instead of being forced to sneak and hide the fact that I am teaching kids academic skills in a direct manner.
The unfortunate fact is that school choice is not just a minority idea, it is a teeny-weensy minority idea. Most people are against it. This is a rather ineluctable obstacle to seeing any effective school choice initiatives.
sorry - haven't read the thread - but I'll dive in anyway and mention that Ed has repeatedly said to me that professionals and unions don't mix well for historical reasons that I have yet to grasp.
It's not that unions are "bad" and "professionals" are good -- it's that "unions" and "professionals" are two different & somewhat contradictory things.
Professionalism developed at a specific point in time and is intrinsically connected to the idea of the individual being .... responsible? In charge?
I can't remember the way he put it.
I'm going to get him to explain the history of the concept of professionalism at some point.
It's certainly true that a teacher can consider himself or herself to be a professional and can behavior professionally. I would hope that most teachers behavior professionally.
I'll add that I'm not a professional, either. I was quite disappointed when I found this out! Writers aren't professionals. Yes, you can be a professional writer (I am) but you're still not a professional.
I don't know what we are, exactly .... artisans?
Michael Kelly thought of journalism as a craft, which may be a good way of looking at it.
I think Carnine's paper is interesting in this regard. He argues that teaching is an immature profession.
Vicki Snider (will get around to posting her work soon, I hope) argues we need a science of teaching. I would say we already have a science of teaching that is mostly ignored, which may be her point.
I can't tell whether K-12 teaching already is a profession in a place like Singapore.
Actually, this sparks a thought: I've been feeling more and more strongly that we need to "cut out the middle men" standing between parents and teachers -- reduce the power of administrators.
I keep feeling parents should have direct access to teachers (i.e. choosing which teachers to send their kids to, being able to discuss whatever issues arise much more directly than we typically do now, etc.)
It suddenly strikes me that this is exactly the way we interact with many if not most of the professionals in our lives: doctors, dentists, lawyers.
This is partly why people aren't crazy about HMOs - a place like Kaiser puts a thick layer of bureaucracy between the patient and the doctor.
Anyway, as I say, I haven't read the thread, and I certainly don't mean to insult teachers or union members by saying that teaching isn't a profession yet.
Actually, this sparks a thought: I've been feeling more and more strongly that we need to "cut out the middle men" standing between parents and teachers -- reduce the power of administrators.
In California, where school funding and standards comes from the state, I feel it would be completely appropriate to eliminate school districts and devolve the district responsibilities down to the school level.
Because there is no longer a direct link between the district and the area that funds it, they don't do much other than inefficiently provide services to the individual schools.
I would also prefer all teachers to be "at will" employees (as I am, and as everyone is in California who does not have a contract to the contrary) who could be hired and fired in the same manner as any other employee in California.
Neither of these things is ever going to happen, of course.
"Parents have no part -- and neither do teachers."
This isn't true in our area. The teachers contribute directly to the selection of curriculum and the establishent of standards. They are not micromanaged at all. In fact, they are given enormous leeway. I have been lectured at by a number of teachers who presume that I need to be informed about proper education.
But do not think for a moment that the school does not take into serious consideration the concerns of all invested parties, especially when it comes to the granting of tenure, which has changed greatly, for many reasons, over the last few years.
Why shouldn't I think that? How about if I do think that schools are ignoring the impact of the teacher on student achievement, when students are the mostinvested party.
Do you have any evidence that schools are taking into serious consideration the effectiveness of the teaching in the classroom in making decisions on tenure?
I can tell you that my district has a very comprehensive teacher performance review system (tons of time and paperwork for all involved) which differs according to amount of experience teacher has had but is still complex and covers many items.
Notably absent from ANY assessment at ANY time is consideration of student achievement. It does not figure into evaluating the teacher in any way.
There is no system in place to track teacher effectiveness in terms of student learning, either, so efforts to include it would be frustrated by lack of data.
Post a Comment