Erin Johnson on public school management

in a comment on Flypaper, Erin Johnson wrote:

Given the wave after wave of ill-conceived curricular reforms that have been imposed upon teachers (Whole language, Constructivist math, etc.) how would eliminating tenure affect teachers that are “being held accountable for student performance” and yet are being told by their administration that they must use poor curricula. Talk about being caught between a rock and a hard place.

If we wanted principals to “stop acting like middle managers and start acting as true CEOs of their school” then we should be holding principals accountable for performance not the teachers. Or how about holding district superintendents or curricula specialists accountable for the misguided materials that they insist that teachers are to use in the classroom? In business, the leaders are always more responsible than their direct reports.

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