Woody Allen On Education

I have been trying to write this for a while, but just didn't know how. Now I do.

I watched a documentary about Woody Allen a couple days ago. I always liked Woody Allen movies. I learned about his work ethic (strong--writes every day and puts out a movie a year, good or bad) and how he is able to get such great performances out of actors.

The thing he does first is cast well. He meets an actor for a minute or 2 (or 10 seconds) and decides if they are right for the part. If they get the job but don't work out, he blames himself for poor casting, fires them and hires someone else. No big deal, not a value judgement. It's not about worth, it's about fit. And he tells his actors the script is just an outline and they can change lines all they want as long as the meaning isn't lost; he's going for realism, and when actors can use their own words, it's just more realistic, ergo better.

Actors rave about Woody's direction -- which is minimal to non-existent, unless an actor asks for more direction. When an actor needs direction, Woody gives only positive comments and tries to make the actor comfortable so the actor can then give the best performance she is capable of. No pressure. Woody has a belief in the actor's ability to act and expects they will. They are professionals. A few Best Actor/Actress nominations and Oscars later, his method appears sound.

Again, actors love being directed by Woody because he believes in them and leaves them alone to do what they do--act.

What does this have to do with education reform? Well, reformers like Arne Duncan, Bill Gates and the rest of them seem to operate in the opposite fashion; the anti-Woody.

Reformers have no trust in the actors (teachers). They make us follow a script we cannot alter. They tell us to do certain prescribed things in certain prescribed ways for certain prescribed purposes, none of which help children or allow teachers --gifted or not-- to reach their potential (earn a nomination or get an Oscar). Woody creates conditions where actors not only are responsible for their performance, but are free to do their best; Woody does not know how to get them to give their best. He trusts they will with enough freedom and positive support. The public love his movies and the Academy awards his movies and actors Oscars.

Woody doesn't read reviews and doesn't care for the Oscars. He thinks the awards are arbitrary. I agree.

The point, if you haven't got it sussed yet, is to leave teachers alone. Let them do what they do. Give them the support they need. Then they will be awesome.

(This probably true of every profession)

If It Were About The Children....

Reforming School Reform 

---

by Matthew L. Mandel, NBCT

It’s not about the children.

The education reform movement, at least here in Pennsylvania, may be about a lot of things, but it certainly isn’t about our children.

If it were, efforts to bridge the achievement gap and advance opportunities for all children would look a hell of a lot different.

If it were about children, each and every public school would be awash in resources and technology. A licensed school nurse would be in each and every building so that the health and safety of kids were not compromised. All schools would have these necessities, not just “experimental” and privately-managed schools who are flooded these and then labeled a success.

If it were about children, students in the poorest neighborhoods—those most at-risk—would step into vibrant learning environments each morning—schools that met their intellectual, artistic, and athletic needs and inclinations. Schools would not be turned into grim test-prep facilities, with a curriculum narrowed to core, state-tested subjects. Children would be given a reason to be excited about coming to school, aside from making AYP.

It’s not about the children.

If it were about children, we wouldn’t value differentiated instruction, then test children all the same way.

If it were about children, schools would be as safe as the offices of those politicians in Harrisburg who cut funding to public schools, and then hand out EMO contracts to campaign contributors and others once a school has been labeled a “failure.”

If it were about children, those who cut funding for vital family services would realize the inextricable link between childhood poverty and educational outcomes. These same politicians would be as incensed by children in their state having inadequate nourishment, dental, vision, and medical care as they are about whether same-sex partners have a right to be married.

If it were about children, in Philadelphia, a state takeover charged with both improving financial management and educational outcomes would be put to rest as a failed experiment. A district’s management team wouldn’t be able to run a district into insolvency, say they are sorry, and then move on to lucrative consultant positions. Reformists like Michelle Rhee and Arlene Ackerman—who help to cultivate a culture of testing “irregularities”—wouldn’t be allowed to exit with a golden parachute before being held accountable for the results under their leadership.

If it were about children, boisterous, spotlight-seeking politicians who wax poetic about school vouchers as an elixir for what ills public schools would be required to do their own homework and examine research that compellingly indicates that vouchers don’t work. These same politicians would also be too embarrassed to call the fight for vouchers in Pennsylvania “the Civil Rights battle of our generation.” Our nation’s true Civil Rights leaders died trying to create greater opportunities for those without. Proponents of Senate Bill 1 are crusaders for someone’s interests, just not for our children’s.

If it were about children, legislators who stump for vouchers would have to guarantee a source of funding to bridge the gap between the value of the voucher and the cost of tuition at elite public and private schools. They wouldn’t be allowed to get away with deceiving families with the notion of “choice” when such choice belongs solely to the schools, not to the students and their families.

If it were about children, no Federal mandates could exist unless they were adequately funded.

If it were about children, big money philanthropy wouldn’t be the driving force in education reform; it would be research instead . As in the field of Medicine, what works in the field of Education would be replicated in schools and districts throughout the country. Theories and strategies that do not work would be discarded. Academic historians like Diane Ravitch wouldn’t be labeled “traitors” because they no longer support business-model reforms. An intellectual, not a politician, Ravitch lets research and outcomes influence her conclusions. What a novel idea.

If it were about children, teachers would be held in the highest regard. Those politicians who were bullies with a microphone when I debated them at Bright Hope Baptist Church wouldn’t be allowed to posture that they are the ones “fighting for children.” They are not in classrooms, every day—knee to knee, often amid poor conditions and with inadequate resources—advocating for our youngest and most at-risk. 

If it were about children, those who judge me would be able to do my job—today—not just be able to read a book in front of the cameras. My competency and teaching acumen would not be reduced to elements—such as the quality of my bulletin boards or organization of my students’ constructed response folders—that do not adequately convey my skill and my passion.

And if it were about children, teachers would be respected partners in any dialogue on necessary reforms. In what other profession are practitioners in the field given so little respect for their knowledge, insights, and contributions?

And if it were about children, 

teachers would be respected partners 

in any dialogue on necessary reforms.

None of the above is an apology for what improvements are necessary. No self-respecting professional believes he or she can’t do better and that things don’t need to improve. 

But I choose to believe that a state that can build billion-dollar stadiums, raise millions to save works of art from being relocated, and create impenetrable bubbles of security around visiting dignitaries (in a country that can allocate trillions of dollars in resources to fight with such gallantry and precision in foreign lands) can surely have the ability to effect change that works for all children.

Education reform, here and elsewhere, is about a lot of things. It’s about access to billions of public dollars. It’s about politics and kickbacks for friends and donors. It’s about retaliation and retribution. It’s about religion, right-wing values, and anti-unionism. It’s about creating more, but for fewer, and to hell with the rest. It is, in effect, a form of child abuse in a digestible political wrapper.

But it certainly isn’t about children.

TFT Interviews Jersey Jazzman Sunday!

A Teacher Poem

The New Ideal Teacher - A Poem

The New Ideal Teacher
By David Lee Finkle

The new ideal teacher
Is driven by data,
And kids become points
On her test-score schemata.
Winnie is a "1" and must be forced to make a gain.
Theo is a "3" and that's a score he must maintain.
Freddy is a "5"; there's no more room inside his brain.
The new ideal teacher
Wants things she can measure;
If it fits on a chart,
Then it's something to treasure.

For the new ideal teacher,
It's shame or it's merit.
She's caught in between...
Well, a stick and a carrot.
The scores control her destiny, for better or for worse.
If scores are high, then there could be more money in her purse.
If low she might discover her career is in a hearse.
The ideal teacher's wallet
Is empty or padded
Depending on value
Deducted or added.

The new ideal teacher
Does not plan her lessons.
Her classes are all pre-
Fab learning-gains sessions.
Today is lesson thirty-seven; tomorrow's thirty-eight.
Page by page the pacing guide ensures she won't run late,
Just like the teacher down the hall and in some other state.
Original thought
She's been taught
To self-censor.
She pops lessons out like big Pez dispenser.

The new ideal teacher
Doesn't question or query.
She does as she's told;
She's compliant and cheery.
When someone says, "It's best for kids!" she'll never even blink.
When she is told her pay's been cut, her spirits never sink.
When buried under new reforms, she'll never raise a stink.
She'll teach critical thinking
From a book off the shelf,
But she never would think
She might think for herself.

The new ideal teacher
Can prioritize:
She puts first things first,
And she won't compromise.
Good test scores are number one; they lead to higher pay,
Which, of course, is number two-- more money makes her day.
Fidelity is third: give her a script; she'll never stray.
The new ideal teacher
Is stalwart and steadfast.
The system comes first,
So her students come dead last.

The Real Mr. Fitz

TFT's #SOSChat Radio Is Fully Funded!

We did it! You all donated and now I have a Premium account at Blog Talk Radio. Thank you so very much. I can now host whenever I want and for up to 2 hours! Awesome!

Many thanks to all who donated. In a year, I will have to ask for donations again, but don't let that stop you from donating today, or again! Do it frequently!

For the inaugural show I have invited Michael Butz (a fellow Deadhead and the reason for the picture above) to talk with me about education reform, especially as touted by Michelle Rhee and Students First. We will have an hour to talk and many guests have been invited to call in. We have a little community over at the SF FB page, and this show is an opportunity to actually speak with each other.

It was tough getting Mike to come on. I had to prove to him it would be okay. He now knows it will be fun. Good for him! He's right!

So, set the date: March 21st at 7pm PST.

California Commission On Teacher Credentialing Lawyer Blows The California Education Whistle!

Kathleen Carroll, an attorney and fired whistleblower at the California Commission On Teacher Credentials attended the March 5, 2012 rally for public education at the State Capitol and talks about the organized destruction of public education in California and who is responsible for this crisis. Included in her comments is the role of Apple and other online education companies who are draining funds from public schools. She also calls for the investigation and prosecution of illegal actions by lobbyists funded by the Gates Foundation and Broad Foundation who are illegally voting on public money to private schools in which they have an economic interest. She questions why California Attorney General Kamala Harris has refused to investigate and also whey Governor Jerry Brown is continuing to allow criminal activity at the Commission On Teacher Credentials. The California Commission On Teacher Credentials is under the direct authority of Governor Brown and his office.

Ed Reform – Reducing Teaching to Sophie’s Choice

This will be a difficult blog for many to read. For some, the overarching subject matter will raise powerful emotions of anger and rage. For others the realization of being intensely manipulated and forced to compromise morals and integrity will also raise powerful emotions of anger and rage. My intention is to expose parallels between two cultures. My intention is to make you think. One event is monumentally abhorrent, intensely immoral, and a crime against humanity of such a magnitude, there are no words to describe it. The other event pales in comparison. So before I go any further, I offer my sincere and humble apologies to anyone who may be offended or may think I am over stepping my bounds, or making inappropriate comparisons.

In World War II, Germany’s Nazi regime owed much of its power and domination to a reign of abject and merciless terror. It was accepted policy to enter into a defeated town or village, round up the entire population to witness a wholesale slaughter of town leaders and “undesirables.” This was done to set the tone and show the survivors the consequences for defying the Reich. The Nazi's understood this: When you can strike terror into the hearts of many, you can get them to do most anything you want.

The remarkable American film, Sophie’s Choice, illustrated some of the heartless and cold blooded terrorist techniques the Nazi’s used to crush the will of people. In the movie, Sophie (Meryl Streep) reveals to her lover the tragic episode of the choice between her children in Auschwitz. Upon arrival, Sophie was forced to choose which one of her two children would be gassed and which would proceed to the labor camp. To avoid having both children killed, she chose Jan (Adrian Kaltika), her son, to be sent to the children's camp, and her daughter, Eva (Jennifer Lawn), to be sent to her death in Crematorium Two. This is an unbelievably heartbreaking decision of such a magnitude there are no words to describe it. This is a decision no human being should ever have to face and one that rattles our sensibilities to their very core. This episode reaffirms how the Nazi's understood that when you can strike terror into the hearts of many, you can get them to do most anything you want.

Here is where this conversation will likely get tough and upset many.

The realities of today’s education landscape include excessive testing, NCLB, RttT, public humiliation, VAM rankings, no LIFO, and no tenure. The consequences associated with going against these realities invoke increasing degrees of censure including Federal punishments ranging from schools, districts, and entire states being labeled as failures, school closures, and now public humiliation.

Combined, all of these sanctions and punishments strike terror into the hearts of teachers. Teacher's are scrambling to find ways to not be noticed. We are desperate to both do the right thing by our students AND survive the gauntlet laid down by the Federal Department of Education and its Status Quo reform policies of NCLB, RttT, public humiliation, VAM rankings, no LIFO, and no tenure.

Teacher all across the nation lament the pressure to raise sore, the pressure to forego teaching for test prep, the damage they see year after year as kids are pushed through the assembly line of the classroom experiences. Today's school experience has been institutionally demoted to not much more than a test data mill.

In private, teachers wish to rise up and fight the oppressive regime that imposes such harsh sanctions for failing or being otherwise undesirable to the Status Quo. In private, teachers wish they had options.

Then they remember what happened to the Teachers in Wisconsin, or they consider the 50% impact student test scores have on teachers in states like Florida that has already been conquered and dominated by the reformers. And quickly, teachers retreat hoping to remain under the radar of sanctions. Quickly the thoughts turn to ways to keep their VAM scores up to avoid the public tarring and feathering experienced by Pascale Mauclair after the New York Post declared her “The city’s worst teacher” based on wonky VAM scores. The Federal government has, in essence, championed a system and dynamic that facilitates rounding up undesirables, parading them into the town square and then make a public example out of them.

So here is the modern teacher’s “Sophie’s Choice.” When it comes down to a choice between providing a home for our own kids and keeping food on our own tables by dancing at the end of the reform puppeteers stings, caving to the pressure of foregoing teaching for test prep, and push kids through the test data mill assembly line regardless of real learning, most will choose the dance and sacrifice their students to the requirements of the regime.

In reality, neither the security of career and home nor the well being of the students should be on the sacrificial block. But when the choice given to teachers is between placating the test mill regime and sacrificing kids' learning, or teach the way it is meant to be and excite the hearts and minds of kids at the risk of kids' scores dropping and probable sanctions and/or dismissal, education places teachers squarely in the immoral position of making a modern parallel to Sophie’s Choice.

The DOE Would Like To Ruin Public Schools: The Proof (Updated)

This document, from your government, basically enshrines the notion that teachers should be evaluated based on the scores of their students, that teacher certification is for fools (hire TFA instead), and unions and job security are bad ideas. Thank your President, Barack Obama for hiring the idiot Arne Duncan whose work we see below. The definition of "douche-bag" is "Arne Duncan."

SUPPORTING EFFECTIVE TEACHERS IN THE CLASSROOM 

THE PROBLEM:

The teacher quality policies under No Child Left Behind (NCLB) were intended to encourage better educators in schools. But in the 10 years since the law’s enactment, the “Highly Qualified Teacher” requirements have placed too much emphasis on a teacher’s credentials and tenure and imposed significant burdens on states and schools, while paying little attention to student learning.

When it comes to getting better teachers in our schools, these “Highly Qualified Teacher” provisions can do more harm than good. As former elementary school teacher Deborah Ball stated at a House Education and the Workforce Committee hearing, “Right now, teachers are considered qualified simply by participating in an approved program or completing an academic major. This means that being qualified does not depend on demonstrating that you can teach.”

THE SOLUTION:

Parents know the best teachers are the ones who keep students motivated and challenged in the classroom. Instead of relying on teacher credential or tenure requirements, which provide little information about teachers’ ability to help students excel in the classroom, the Student Success Act and the Encouraging Innovation and Effective Teachers Act will ensure states and school districts have the tools necessary to effectively measure an educator’s influence on student achievement.


THE STUDENT SUCCESS ACT AND THE ENCOURAGING INNOVATION AND EFFECTIVE TEACHERS ACT

-Repeal federal "Highly Qualified Teacher" requirements.

-Support the development and implementation of teacher evaluation systems to ensure parents have the information they need to make decisions about their child’s education.

-Set broad parameters – including linkages to student achievement data – that must be included in any teacher evaluation system, but allows states and school districts to design their own systems.

-Require states and school districts to seek input from parents, teachers, school leaders, and other staff as they develop the evaluation system.

-Encourage states and school districts to make personnel decisions based on the evaluations, as determined by the school district.

-Consolidate teacher quality programs into a new Teacher and School Leader Flexible Grant, which supports creative approaches to recruit and retain effective educators.

Your Government

Update: I should not have said this was a DOE document. It's not. It's an Education and the Workforce Committee document, like the banner shows. I got ahead of myself.

Tim Furman (SchoolTechConnect) in the comments gently pointed that out to me. And he also made an interesting point--this came out of a Republican led committee and only Republicans voted for it. Still, it includes many of the things Duncan and Obama want. So why did it get published? Is it for, as Tim put it, a bad cop/worse cop scenario?

I put nothing past the reformers. Arne will love this document. It might as well be a DOE document. I predict, in large part it will become one anyway.

The Truth About Arne, Rahm & Chicago

A Black Agenda Radio commentary by Glen Ford

Educational policy in the Obama era isn't about education at all. It's about replacing skilled, experienced teachers with rootless temps better suited to serve in the privatized holding tanks they wish to turn public schools in poor neighborhoods into, for a population on its way to low wage jobs and prisons.

...BlackAgendaReport 

 

We Need To Hear The Voices Of The Students!

Yesterday there was a twitter chat --#SOSChat-- that I spent a little time checking out and participating in. It was a chance for those of us concerned with education reform and the damage it's doing to get together to figure out how best to move forward; what will SOS look like? What should we do next? Where should we focus? It's the kind of stuff a grassroots organization needs to do, and it was extremely helpful.

For a while now I have been doing Blog Talk Radio, both my own shows and as a guest on other shows (there's a link at the top of this blog) as a way to spread the word about the dangers of the current reform proposals and the nonsense Michelle Rhee spouts about LIFO and tenure, among other things. Doing the radio shows is fun and a great way to meet new folks and have meaningful discussions and disseminate information.

A while back I had the thought that it would be a good idea to include the voices of actual kids --students-- in the mix. I never really tried to do it. I talked with my 14 year old and some of his friends and I know they have opinions about reform, but they are 14 and getting them to commit was something I didn't even really try very hard to do, so it never happened. My bad.

Well, after the #SOSChat I realized that we anti-reformers are pretty much all over the place in terms of strategy ideas to spread the word. There are a million suggestions that I won't go over here. But there are two suggestions I have that occurred to me as I was participating in the chat:

1. Numbers. Numbers matter. Stephen Krashen made the point that Lady GaGa has 2 million followers and Diane Ravitch only in the thousands. I agree that's ridiculous, considering there are two million teachers in America. Want to impress? Get Diane's follower count up into the millions. Krashen's too.

I have a feeling there are about a million teachers who aren't on twitter. Find them. Get them on twitter, even if just to Follow Diane and then never tweet again.

2. The public think teachers suck--in the aggregate. People like their own teacher, think less of other teachers in the school, even less of others in the district, even less of others in the state, and even less of teachers nationally. It's just like congress where you like your congressperson but hate congress.

Therefore, I have determined, our voices are pretty much moot. They are not really that helpful. We need the voices of others--a proxy. Parents are a good proxy.

Kids are better. Interview kids.

So I want to interview public school students on Blog Talk Radio. I want teenagers to tell the public what they see their teachers dealing with. I want to hear what the teachers do for these kids, or what they don't do. I want kids to tell me what they like about school and what they think should change. I want to hear honest assessments of what life on the ground in public school is like for teenagers.

But that's not all. I want young kids too! Yes, like 2nd grade! When I taught 2nd grade I always had a few kids who could easily do their own radio show if given the chance. Surely there are some young kids who could handle a half-hour interview.

I will need parent input and permission. It can all be done over the phone and by email.

Are you interested in being interviewed? Are you a parent of a student who might be interested? Get in touch.

Obama & Duncan Think Teachers Are Just Too Stupid

When the "Best and the Brightest" Don't Have the Answers- President Obama's Approach to School Reform

“The Best And the Brightest”- President Obama’s Approach to School Reform

President Obama and Education Secretary Arne Duncan announced modifications to the No Child Left Behind program on Thursday at the White House., Pablo Martinez Monsivais / AP Photo

When Barack Obama ascended to the Presidency, he was fired up with a desire to improve America’s schools, which he felt were falling behind those of other advanced countries. He decided to bring “the best minds in the country” in to help them with this task- CEO’s of successful businesses, heads of major foundations, young executives from management consulting firms- to figure out a strategy to transform America’s schools, especially those in low performing districts. He promised them full support of his Administration when they finally came up with effective strategies including the use of federal funding to persuade, and if necessary, compel local districts to implement them.

Notably missing in this brain trust were representatives of America’s teachers and school administrators, but their absence was not accidental. Because the President and his chief education adviser, Arne Duncan, believed that a key problem in America’s schools was the low quality of the people working in them, they felt no need to include principals and teachers in the Administrations education planning, especially since those plans involved putting pressure on them to perform and then removing those who couldn’t meet the new standards.

From a management standpoint the reforms developed, which including promoting competition, universalizing teacher evaluation based on student test scores, introducing merit pay, made perfect sense. However, since none of the people developing the reforms had spent much time in a classroom, or were willing to spend a significant part of their lives performing the jobs they were reshaping, they had little idea what their reforms meant “on the ground,” and even less evidence that, when implemented, they would be effective.

Now three years later, after all of these new policies have been put into effect, from New York to Chicago, to Philadelphia to Buffalo, there is no evidence than America’s schools are performing better than when the President entered office, or that the test score gap between wealthy and poor districts is being reduced. But evidence and experience doesn’t seem to matter when you bring “the best minds in the country” together to develop a strategy. Come on, how can Bill Gates, Eli Broad, Michael Bloomberg, and the Ivy League gurus from Teach for America be wrong, and graduates of state teachers colleges and teacher education programs be right?

But reality has a way of intruding even on “the best and the brightest” when the fundamental assumptions that guide policy are wrong. This happened during the Vietnam War, when an indigenous nationalist revolution was treated as an arm of a global Communist conspiracy, and it is happening now when school failures due to poverty and inequality are being blamed on incompetent teachers and administrators.

So as in Vietnam, we will invest hundreds of billions, maybe trillions of dollars in a cause, which, at the end of the day, will turn into a Fool’s Errand, undermining the careers and demeaning the efforts of the nation’s teachers, dividing communities against themselves, while fattening the pockets of consulting form, test companies and on line learning firms.

And ten years down the road, when all the damage is done, policy makers will wake up and call America’s teachers back in to ask “What do you think we should do?” And they will say that teaching has to be a life time calling, and that when dealing with children, there are no miracles- opening minds, and changing lives, requires hard work, persistence, imagination, and a love for the young people you are working with. And those are tasks that cannot be performed by computers or “managed” by people who have never worked with children themselves.

Mark Naison
February 12, 1012

Education And The Business Model: Pwned. Sound The Death Knell

Using the rules of economics, and assuming we must achieve universal post-secondary readiness, MN2020’s latest report, False Choices: Market-Driven Education Reform Doesn’t Work, demonstrates why free market thinking in education comes at a high price for students, parents and teachers.

The main problem, among many, is that school systems cannot function as free markets if we want to achieve universal post-secondary readiness. Free markets produce efficiency, not equity for all. Efficiency helps maximize profit, but what about students that aren’t profitable to educate?

As a result of competition-based thinking, many schools have focused on teaching-to-tests and advertising instead of broad based cognitive development that will provide students with the necessary skills to be successful in a 21st century workforce.

In moving Minnesota back toward a proven educational path, our latest report makes the following recommendations:

There is a place in education for efficiency, incentives, and innovation; however, policymakers must stop trying to achieve these competitive goals with a false, market-based approach.

Schools must adapt to achieve universal post-secondary readiness by focusing on initiatives that enhance teachers’ professional development and provide comprehensive teacher assessment and feedback.

Instead of using a false market-mentality as political cover to systematically defund schools, we must invest in education for the 21st century, using some of that investment to develop a comprehensive and fair teacher evaluation metric.

Charter schools have a place in the public education system as partners, not competitors, with traditional schools.

Michael Diedrich

Teaching Is An Art (So Is Lawyering). VAM Can't Work: Updated

I came across a quote today from Sandra Day O'Connor:

"Attorney errors come in an infinite variety and are as likely to be
utterly harmless in a particular case as they are to be prejudicial. They
cannot be classified according to likelihood of causing prejudice. Nor can
they be defined with sufficient precision to inform defense attorneys
correctly just what conduct to avoid. Representation is an art, and an act
or omission that is unprofessional in one case may be sound or even
brilliant in another."

Yeah, teaching too. VAM can't work. It just can't.

Update: So I admit a friend and I are having an email exchange about this science vs. art thing. Here is why I say teaching --and lawyering and doctoring-- is more art than science:

Lawyers, doctors, teachers all have basic knowledge without which they
could not practice the art. These professions are art in the same way
jazz is art--it requires knowledge of music, but then you get to be
creative.

When 2 or 3 different people could perform the job differently and still
end up with a good expected outcome, that implies there is more than
science to it, there must be art.

My surgery required dumping my guts onto the table. I am sure there are
a few ways to do that and a few outcomes depending on the different
ways. I assume there is more than one good or bad way to do that.

Same with trying a case, or teaching a concept, or sewing up my gut.

Update II: Here is the rest of the email exchange. My friend, referred to below as "The Law" is a lawyer. I have summarized her emails to just the pertinent questions I am responding to.


TFT:

The science part of teaching is understanding how kids learn, not the subject matter (though in upper grades the subject matter knowledge is clearly crucial, but still it's not the sole science part). And, how kids learn varies, and science has a hard time pinning much down in this domain, leaving it to art and situational awareness that comes with practice.

Aren't the best trial lawyers performance artists as well as highly knowledgeable about precedents, torts, and whatever else you lawyers have to know about that you learn in law school and then promptly realize it wasn't all that helpful and the only way to get good at trial lawyering is to do it? And we measure trial lawyers by wins and losses, right? Not by their actual performance in the courtroom. Right? And surgeons are rated on survival rates, not on procedure, unless the outcome was bad, then procedures are looked at, right? All this sounds like teaching--we look at outcomes. Except that for teaching, like the family doctor, much of what they do is dependent on things they don't control--diet, homework, and the rest.

You can't measure art, really, can you? I mean, perhaps in the most rudimentary way--painters should use paint and understand something about form, shadow, line, and all that stuff (the science of the art), but one person's art is another person's garbage, right?

Art certainly isn't VAMable, I don't think.

Can we measure my progress by looking at (name redacted) [a middle class, white, gifted student who loved my class and was challenged, and who was tender to the Hispanic student. Sweet.]? Or should we look at (name redacted) [a Hispanic student whose father was in jail and was homeless off and on during the year and scored poorly but whose attitude towards life seemed to improve in my class], whose life was basically devastated from birth? [Middle class student] would have advanced without me. [Hispanic student] didn't advance much, but his sense of self I think got better in my class. Can we measure [Hispanic student]'s sense of self? I don't think so.

I think teaching is a lot like the 1984 case you write about--it's a judgement call reserved for those in charge--professional judgement. There is no standard we can measure against, so we have to measure against what the professionals have gleaned over their years as professionals practicing their art.

Perhaps my use of Art and Science are too broad, but I don't know how else to separate the 2 domains. I also think that there are fewer rules for teachers than other professions. It's more like a therapist than a doctor or lawyer. There are standards of care, policies about privacy and pedagogy (therapy) but each patient (class) is different and will be taught (therapized) differently. In both cases the professional is steeped in the science underpinning their profession, but the actual doing of it seems more like art--the thing the science-knowledge frees you to do.

How's that?

The Law:

Your first sentence answers one of my original questions, I wanted to know whether there was a science to the teaching, as opposed to the subject matter.

TFT:

VAM can't control for family attributes (SES). Of factors that impact a child's ability to learn (do well on a test, more accurately, which is NOT an accurate measure of the child's true ability), most knowledgeable folks say that between 10 and 30% of factors come from school, the rest come from home, as [made obvious] by [Hsp student] and [MC student], among others.

The test--the high stakes test at the end of the year--is what VAM uses. That fact alone makes VAM useless, as one test on one day does not accurately reflect much of anything about the teacher or the student. I suppose that if the whole class did incredibly well, or badly, one could generalize about the teacher. But that's obvious. It's when VAM is used to differentiate between teachers who, on the whole, are relatively similar. VAM does not have the power to do it--it's too prone to error. It is not a measure that can be used, as the variables can't be controlled like they can in industry by controlling inputs (materials/students).

Reformers would have you believe that there is a science to teaching (pedagogy) and charters have figured it out. And that's bullshit. Charters have figured out how to control inputs. There is no science of pedagogy, really. That's my argument--pedagogy is an art. Teaching is an art. Sure, it has some science behind it--brain development, motor development, some stable psychological concepts, but for the most part, it's art.

So, the reformers abuse science's power by giving it more than it deserves in this domain, and they belittle the art of teaching by scripting teachers with curricula that claim to be research based (science) when they aren't cuz there ain't no science they can actually point to, and the research is usually not actual research but a working paper from the publisher or a CMO funded meta-review. Remember, Everyday Math is "research based" but most mathematicians pillory it for its stupidity. It was pushed through after packing the board of the What Works Clearinghouse.

The actual research performed over the past 70 years shows, unequivocally, that home factors make or break a kid. Not teachers. Not schools. Not curricula. Home is where the issues are. And that is where poverty lives.

The reform movement uses bullshit disguised as science (the NYT article on that latest "study" being a perfect example). They can't acknowledge poverty because that would undercut their scheme that claims they know how to save kids with their new pedagogy that is in evidence in their charters that do well. Except few of them do, and the ones that do well control their inputs. Ask KIPP, Aspire, HCZ, HSA and the rest. They've all been in trouble for scheming the inputs.

How's that?

The Law:

Or is good teaching like pornography -- I know it when I see it?

TFT:

Yes. It's exactly like pornography--you know it when you see it. Seriously. Like your lawyer scenario. Porn, teaching, lawyering--non-VAMable.

Activists, educators and academics you should be aware of include:

Dr. Diane Ravitch
Dr. Deborah Meier
Dr. Stephen Krashen
Dr. Shaun Johnson
Anthony Cody
Leoni Haimson
Matt Damon
Jon Stewart
P.L. Thomas



Here are some links to experts. Some are a bit long, but you can and should do it!

--Richard Rothstein looks at An overemphasis on teachers

--and Rothstein again, with others:

Narrowing the Achievement Gap for Low-Income Children: A 19-Year Life Cycle Approach

By Richard Rothstein, Tamara Wilder and Whitney C. Allgood | 2008

--One and another by Jim Horn (of Cambridge College) on VAM.

We Are An ARMY of Teachers

By Dave Russell

I just got finished reading a post on United Opt Out National’s blog titled: “A Teacher Story: Why I’m Leaving Public Education.” It is a real story about one teacher’s experiences with abusive policies surrounding testing mania that lead to the hard decision to leave education. If you haven’t read it, do so. It is raw, brutally honest, and exposes the realities of “reform.” After reading it, I was compelled to leave the following remark:

“God Damn-it! This pisses me off so much, I am seeing red. I so understand your feelings of defeat and fully support your decision, as will so many of us who are facing or have faced this Gauntlet of emotional, professional, and spiritual beatings. Understand, I wish you nothing but the best in whatever the future may hold for you - may you land on your feet and once again find your bliss.

What has me so pissed off is that this scenario is EXACTLY what the Oligarch's are gunning for. Here is an experienced, caring teacher with SO much to give to the kids and her fellow teachers who is being so systematically scrutinized, criticized, demoralized, demonized, and a whole lot of "ized's," I haven't thought of that he/she has finally tossed in the towel and is walking away from a lifetime of service and a career born of a deeply rooted passion for kids.

This is nothing less than "teacher cleansing" where teachers are systemically targeted for professional scrutiny and punishment based on salary, political reasons, or some other arbitrary or capricious reason. As the "business model" continues to invade schools like the tentacles of a corrosive cancer, we will see more and more of this type of decimation happen among our ranks.

And don't kid yourself, as Michelle Rhee continues to successfully lobby for the removal of LIFO and tenure, we will see our most experiences (read expensive) teachers get bloodied by the very tactics our author experienced. The outcome is predictable. Toss the expensive teachers on the curb like so much trash, gather all that salary and hire short-term contract scabs and pay them gobs of bonus money for successfully teaching to the test and raising scores.

We are an ARMY of teachers fed up with this! We are a sleeping giant ready to roar, claw back the oppression and RESTORE education to a colorful world where kids are free to explore the world around them in a safe and encouraging way. Fear has us paralyzed. Tradition has us waiting. The machine is counting on our passivity. And if we don't coalesce and act NOW, before long we too will be walking the gauntlet, getting bloodied, and being tossed out on our own ear.”

This Is My Last Straw - Is It Yours Too?

By Dave Russell

As a teacher, I have sat and watched our children increasingly suffer needlessly as the life of the of the school day has been systematically suffocated to the pallor of a deathly grey. The gauntlet of NCLB has morphed into the scourge of the corporate take-over model which spawned a full on attack warrior in the form of Michelle Rhee and her "resistance is futile" lobby group, StudentsFirst. My blood boils every time she rolls out a new Madison Avenue savvy propaganda smear or full court press media blitz designed to further the Oligarch's planned agenda for education takeover, uh...I mean "reform."

As my anger and frustration has grown, nothing has enraged me to the boiling point more than the recent publicity buzz flying around the paper authored by Economists Raj Chetty and John N. Friedman of Harvard and Jonah E. Rockoff of Columbia. In this 92 page report, these economic experts claim to have tracked 2.5 million students over 20 years concluding that the kids with improving test scores had lower teen-pregnancy rates and higher college-enrollment rates than their peers. They also had higher earnings, lived in better neighborhoods, and even saved more for retirement. In a front page article about the paper, The New York Times concludes “test scores help you get more education, and that more education has an earnings effect" (how's that again...test sores do what now?).

It's not too surprising that nobody was quicker to pick up on this paper and trumpet the message from this cherry bit of propaganda than Michelle Rhee and the merry Jesters at StudentsFirst! The ballyhoo from StudentsFirst is as predictable as clockwork! Some kluged report jukes the data to develop erroneous conclusions that dance right into the laps of the Rhee/Duncan/Gates Cabal of reformists and BAM! it happens; you place the stick in their hand, they will bang the drum.

This report is hogwash and StudentsFirst should be ashamed for publicizing it. The authors admit that their conclusions are extrapolated from stale data that was gathered in bulk (not for individuals as the summary leaves readers to believe), run through an analysis tool that is so fraught with statistical noise (individual and often conflicting point-source influence on outcome) that their only conclusion --there is far too much noise to disaggregate (take apart) the most reasonable conclusion-- is that teacher quality HAS to be the driving force for the very gains that they couldn't actually track because it was stale and gathered, after all, in bulk. WTF?

But honesty and integrity are not the norm, nor are they qualities valued by this Reformers' Cabal. Instead, truth is denied, facts are skewed, research (real research - not this 5 and dime tinker-toy variety) is overlooked, and professionals at all levels across the nation are ignored and besmirched.

The agenda of StudentsFirst is to use well crafted rhetoric, propaganda and deceptive practices to create false hysteria, create mythic villains in teachers and unions, project horrific consequences should the fabricated travesty be allowed to continue unchecked, and then (wait for it!) charge in like the Knights in Shining Armor they believe themselves to be, carrying their Shield of Righteous Purpose, picture perfect, jiffy-tailored solution that not only sounds good and gives that ever so needed cozy-snugly feel of good satisfaction, but is hawked and carnival barked as the only effective, critical, and urgent fix, and to not support it dooms he world as we know it to inevitable implosion. By God! reading their agenda you would think StudentsFirst is single-handedly saving every child in every classroom every day from a hideous ordeal in the slash & burn world of the indifferent, self-important, selfish, ineffective teacher!

All StudentsFirst is interested in is changing the game so the new power brokers can continue to coerce states and districts into adopting unproven agendas such that expensive teachers can be arbitrarily, capriciously, and summarily tossed onto the curb like so much rubbish only to be replaced by unproven, untrained, two-year commit-me-not ivy-league Slam-Bam-Thank You Ma'amers.

And all this hinges on some snake oil smoke & mirrors algorithm called Value Added Analysis, which in and of itself hinges on students passing a test nobody has ever seen, nobody has ever ensured is aligned to the hundreds of varied curricula and texts, and not fact checked for accuracy or cognitive appropriateness. It is taken on faith by StudentsFirst and the rest of the Rhee/Duncan/Gates Cabal of reformists that the ENTIRE machine that sets the standards, writes the curriculum, formulates the textbooks, writes the tests, scores the tests is SO seamlessly perfect that all children, regardless of socioeconomic status, family (dis)function, language abilities, learning difficulties, or desire to participate, will excel if it weren't for the incredible prevalence of those damned ineffective teachers.

The most aggravating aspect of the agenda water-boarding perpetrated by the whole Rhee/Duncan/Gates Cabal of reformists is that the American public is either too drunk on their cool-aid, too stupid to understand the realities, or too apathetic to do anything but allow their children to be willingly led to the intellectual slaughter.

Too harsh you say? Ask any child in Florida or anywhere else in America how excited they are to come to school. Ask them how relevant the curriculum is to their lives. Ask them when the last time it was that they engaged in test prep - and for how long. Ask them why they even take the test. Ask them if they feel like the institution is encouraging them to live, learn, and grow according to their (student centric) needs as 21st century learners. You want harsh? Listen to these kids rail on the Bull Shit that is the result of decade of reforms designed by a Cabal of reformists who think that the best way to solve our problems is to use a white-hot blowtorch approach to intensifying the same thinking that created the problems in the first place.

To all the members of the Rhee/Duncan/Gates Cabal of reformists and to Race to the Top as well, you can kiss my ass and the collective asses of kids all across America!

The State In Which...

Dave Russell on "The Status Quo"

David L. Russell

Status quo, a commonly used form of the original Latin "statu quo" – literally "the state in which" – is a Latin term meaning the current or existing state of affairs. It has become the ubiquitous slogan of the corporatist reform movement to refer to anyone who disagrees with the – “defenders of the status quo.” It is the perfect word for their agenda because in and of itself, it has no meaning. How silly does this sound: ““defenders of the state in which.” But, oh, the images it conjures! Failing schools, destructive union supporters, ineffective old timer’s who drool while sleeping in class, rubber rooms, dances of the lemons, low achievement – all are images set forth and lumped under the slogan “status quo” by the PR arm of the reform movement. So the beautiful people and everyone who agrees with them are “reformers,” while anyone who disagrees with them are “defenders of the status quo.” But, come on folks – who has ever come out to defend failing schools, destructive union supporters, ineffective old timer’s who drool while sleeping in class, rubber rooms, dances of the lemons, or low achievement.

Here is the “status quo” as I see it. No Child Left Behind (test-based-accountability-as-reform that has been the existing state of affairs (status quo) for a decade, and the research continues to show that it’s not working), compelled teaching to the test, excessive test prep, elimination of the arts from schools, unfunded mandates, blackmailing states to adopt unproven changes, inequitable funding between richer and poorer districts, Mile wide – inch deep curriculum, incorrect, incompatible and inconsistent across and within grade level textbooks, and the list goes on.

So who is really defending the “status quo?” In spite of a decade of glaring evidence of it being an abysmal failure, Arne Duncan, refuses to shut this program down, but instead announced last summer plans to grant waivers from NCLB mandates – none have been granted. In August, 2011, Florida reported that 89% of its schools failed to make required Federal NCLB Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) goals. The threat of punitive Federal funding sanctions has compelled districts to force more teaching to the test and eliminate arts and electives from schools and replace these with test prep. Textbook and curriculum writers are not held accountable for much. Although states will place textbooks on their adoption list that demonstrate evidence that the state’s standards are covered, there are no guidelines whatsoever designed to prevent publishers form creating a product that is not a mile wide – inch deep, incorrect, incompatible or inconsistent across and within grade level textbooks, and the list goes on. And the list goes on.

So the next time you hear someone toss out the term “status quo,” remember they are tossing out a name calling propaganda label designed to demonize the opposition and create scapegoats who supposedly defend failing schools, destructive union supporters, ineffective old timer’s who drool while sleeping in class, rubber rooms, the dance of the lemons, or low achievement. But, what they are really describing is the current or existing state of “NCLB, high stakes testing, punitive sanctions, mile-wide inch deep curriculum, and schools devoid of humanities” affairs.

Why Does The Public Have So Little Faith In Teachers?

This is a comment by Dave Russell over at the SF FB page:

Michael - with all due respect, I have been following Rhee and her commentary from the launch and seeing first hand how her rhetoric and propaganda has been delivered to and received by the public. I have had scores of people talk to me about their perceptions of teachers and education. Soon after Rhee launched StudentsFirst, the flavor of the discussions changed with people I know becoming more embittered to teachers and naming them as the sole reason why American students are 20-whatever in the world. Nearly overnight I became a part of this ambiguous "status quo" and someone who has wrecked budgets and damaged kids because I am a member of a union. Nearly to the person, I heard word for word the same rhetoric and propaganda, nearly word for word, Rhee spouted on her national TV talk media launch blitz.

I wrote the following: " The reason why STEM teachers aren't jumping the broom is because (as we predicted) the smear campaign of StudentsFirst and other reformers against teachers and the institution as a whole has left a PR image of education as a cesspool of angry ineffective cronies who dance at the strings of unions and care nothing about kids or their learning or well being."

I believe if you objectively read the following posts from the standpoint of someone trying to evaluate the profession and determining a career choice/change, the following passages from Rhee blogs reinforce my point that StudentsFirst and other reformers have left a PR image of education as a cesspool and that the tone of these posts is not flattering, inviting and effectively paints the institution in a totally negative light fraught with insurmountable problems that only Rhee can champion and fix:

"Still, I could have done a better job of communicating. I did a particularly bad job letting the many good teachers know that I considered them to be the most important part of the equation. I totally fell down on doing that. As a result, my comments about ineffective teachers were often perceived as an attack on all teachers." "Some people believed I had disdain for the public. It’s not that I wasn’t listening; I just didn’t agree and went in a different direction. There’s no way you can please everyone." "The U.S. is currently 21st, 23rd, and 25th among 30 developed nations in science, reading, and math, respectively. The public-employee unions in D.C., including the teachers’ union, spent huge sums of money to defeat Fenty. The focus remains on what jobs, contracts, and departments are getting which cuts, additions, or changes. The rationale for the decisions mostly rests on which grown-ups will be affected, instead of what will benefit or harm children. The purpose of the teachers’ union is to protect the privileges, priorities, and pay of their members. And they’re doing a great job of that. Conflict was necessary in order to move the agenda forward. There are some fundamental disagreements that exist right now about what kind of progress is possible and what strategies will be most effective. Right now, what we need to do is fight." 12/6/10 Newsweek.

"Ultimately, a great teacher is someone who gets results. If two students with similar backgrounds go to similar schools and take similar classes, and one of those students outperforms the other, it might seem fair to say that that student had a better teacher."

"We will fight to get rid of these bad policies and practices so that every child has an excellent teacher in his or her classroom."

"Challenge the status quo to always push for the right priorities, "

"I’m sure you hate it when your child gets an ineffective teacher, and you probably wonder why that teacher is still in the classroom. Often your school leaders feel the same way, but they usually don’t have full power to choose their workers. Second, some of the silent issues that never get talked about are eating away at your schools’ ability to be effective, like a trend toward central district bureaucracy."

"In the book version of Waiting for “Superman”, Michelle describes one overcrowded high school class where kids not even enrolled showed up every day because they felt this teacher offered them the best opportunity to learn, even though some of them would get no credit for the course."

"If we were to grade the academic performance of the world’s industrialized economies, Singapore, South Korea, and now Shanghai would get an A — the United States would get a C, at best, and in math we'd get an F.Background or socioeconomic status, while influential, is not the determining factor in how well a student can perform. And as I discussed in a blog post yesterday, great teaching can overcome the circumstances that put our kids behind those of other world powers.The bottom line: We need to fight to transform our underperforming education system, overcome the vested interests that stand in the way of progress, and work to ensure that our kids have the best schools in the world."
--------The clear implication and takeaway by the public is that the poor performance on the PISA is because of a lack of "great teachers."

"This week Mayor Villaraigosa called the LA Teachers’ Union to task for obstructing reform by defending an unacceptable status quo in the Los Angeles Public Schools. I’ve never been of the mind that unions shouldn’t exist. I was in one when I was a teacher, and I believe they can play a role in reform by compromising with the newly backed interests (like StudentsFirst) who are representing children. "

"Michelle gets to the heart of how the needs of teachers’ unions and students don't always align, and why America needs a strong counterweight to the special interest groups that have long dictated education policy."

"StudentsFirst scored its first Newsmaker interview to help explain the new study that finds a link between good teachers and good student test scores. Why should you care? StudentsFirst and other reform groups believe a significant part of a teacher’s evaluation should be based on how his or her students demonstrate progress on tests and this study seems to support that practice."

What Happens When The Edu-Bubble Bursts? Jeff Bryant Tells Us

What Happens When The Edu-Bubble Bursts?

By: Jeff Bryant

Heard the term "edu-bubble" yet? Chances are you will soon.

No doubt you've heard of the "dot-com bubble." And if you're like millions of Americans, you may be currently experiencing the ravages of the "housing bubble." But the edu-bubble?

During the dot-com bubble, from 1990-2000, speculative capital drove up the wildly inflated prospects of internet-based businesses. The speculation was driven to a great extent by venture capitalists and MBA-types who argued persuasively that the amount of "eye-balls" attracted to an internet site could be "flipped" into a revenue stream by "monetizing" the passing fancy of people searching the world wide web for just about everything other than haircuts.

But not every business could make the flip. While gambling and porn did fine, selling real goods like healthcare advice, groceries, and pet supplies didn't always do so well, and the whole market came crashing down, and millions lost their jobs and retirement funds.

Some successful businesses -- Cisco, SAS, Dell -- were "forged in the cauldron of the dot-com market," so to speak. And we all got iPhones. So business leaders and policy makers went blithely on their way to the next capitalist wet dream.

The housing bubble followed much the same trajectory as the dot-com forebearer. To a great extent, the wild speculation on real estate that inflated home prices was driven, again, by nefarious "flippers." First, banks and finance firms figured out that worthless mortgages could be monetized into derivative investments on Wall Street, which drove the market for low down-payments and sub-prime mortgages. Then, unbridled real estate investors of all kinds looked to flip the low-down-payment-subprime-loan properties into quick cash.

Again, the whole bubble burst, but this time the consequences were far more severe than the dot-com fallout. Compared to the dot-com bubble, millions more not only lost their jobs and retirement funds but are now in danger of being kicked out of their homes, and jobless rates in the US remain stubbornly high.

Much like the aftermath of the dot-com implosion, the few who benefited the most from the housing bubble are left to go merrily on their way while business leaders and policy makers make excuses and blame the masses for being "irresponsible." And in the meantime, the bubble cycle is pumping up all over again.

According to The Wall Street Journal nonfinancial corporations alone are sitting on over $2 trillion in liquid assets. And it's simply got to have some place to go.

Behold the next victim of capitalism's game of Russian roulette: education.

What better target than a $1 trillion market with a 30+ percent growth rate?

Furthermore, with most of the funding of education controlled by state governments that are now predominantly in the hands of Republicans intent on cutting education, there's a lot of excess demand to be had.

If you doubt at all the edu-bubble is something really happening, then you need to read a recent series of articles from the Miami Herald that report on the $400 million a year charter school industry in South Florida. Driven by real estate developers and politicians, the charter school sector has gotten so big that it now operates as a "parallel system" to traditional public schools, only these schools can collect taxpayer dollars while avoiding much of the oversight that typical public school have to operate under. So they get away with things like shackling schools to exorbitant lease payments, charging students fees, withholding supplies like textbooks, or blatantly under-serving students who happen to be black, poor, or disabled.

Or you should read the article in this week's New York Times reporting on the explosive growth of for-profit online schools. The largest of these enterprises, K-12, Inc., has been a hot item on the stock market despite offering a sub-standard education to school kids because, as the article states, "kids mean money."

How did this happen?

Partially at fault are federal government mandates that force school districts into hiring consultants and developing elaborate and expensive data systems. Many school systems that win federal grants from Race to the Top and School Improvement Grant contests end up spending the bulk of those outlays on outside vendors and services.

But there's a much bigger system at work here.

The first essential step to hyping up the edu-bubble was to find something new to monetize -- something that could be flipped from a public value into a private commodity that could be bought and sold. Except for small-time scandals and dishonest public officials, education had been walled-off, mostly, from large profiteers. So speculators had no proven business models for how to ramp up public education into a private money making machine.

For sure, the "value" on education has long been calculated in terms of what it means to a child's earnings as an adult and how this benefits the economy in the future. But speculators needed something that could pay out in the here and now.

Most of the money in education is tied-up in just two areas -- physical plant and personnel. Those two expenditures alone account for well over 80 percent of what a typical school spends. But with no "revenue" to show in the other side of the balance sheet, venture capitalists were at a loss for how to make schools a matter of financial speculation.

Case in point, one notable edu-venture was Edison Schools which lost millions of dollars every year, showing a profit in just one quarter of the 10 years it was publically traded.

Then education reform advocates -- either unwittingly or intentionally (does it matter?) --gave the venture crowd a huge gift by decreeing that student scores on standardized tests would define the learning "output" that schools would be accountable for. And all of a sudden everything monetarily related to schools -- operations budgets, teacher salaries, classroom costs, government funds, grant money -- could be related to a test score output.

This in effect turned student learning -- and by extension, the students themselves -- into a commodity that could be speculated on. Now that edu-venturists had something they could put on the other side of the balance sheet, they could now "flip" student test scores into a speculative market. And all sorts of "reform" schemes and start-ups -- from starting charter schools to lowering teacher salaries to closing schools -- could be rationalized on the basis of test scores.

In a recent op-ed in the education trade publication Education Week, history teacher Jonathan Keiler explained how this works, at least in relationship of linking test scores to teacher salaries. Once teacher evaluations are tied to test scores, Keiler points out, there is a "system that turns student scores into a market and, as such, creates cheating, disreputable practices, and dislocations."

When student scores become like orange juice, pork bellies, or yen, the people with the greatest incentive to cheat are the weakest teachers and administrators. These people might be weak, but that doesn’t mean they are stupid. Weak but clever educators will inevitably find ways to game the system, sometimes by cheating, but more often by coming close, but not stepping over the line: Educators could turn their courses into nothing but test-prep machines; they could refuse to collaborate with colleagues; they could curry favor with students to encourage better results; or take other steps we can’t imagine. Many of these weaker teachers, even short of cheating, might well end up with excellent “value added” scores, while stronger teachers who are honest and don’t play the sharp game end up looking bad.
This is not just a possible bad outcome, it is inevitable. It is inevitable because markets generate such behavior and dislocations, and the more volatile the market, the greater the undesirable behavior and dislocations will be.

Of course, much like the "eyeballs" from the dot-com bubble and the mortgage derivatives of the housing bubble, test scores driving the edu-bubble are of marginal value.
In the book, The Myths of Standardized Tests: Why They Don’t Tell You What You Think They Do,
Phillip Harris, Bruce M. Smith and Joan Harris explain that standardized tests are less objective than many people believe, they don’t adequately measure student achievement, they don't tell you which schools and teachers are more "effective," and they “inadvertently” lead young people to become “superficial thinkers."

It's true that test scores can give individual teachers insights about their students that can then lead to instructional decisions. And using tests in a diagnostic way to draw conclusions from random samples of students can be very helpful. But making systemic decisions based wholesale on mass testing is an idea that's yet to produce much evidence of being beneficial to students.

Nevertheless, standardized test scores are now the "currency" of education that enables all sorts of resource swaps that would have been unthinkable 20 years ago, including charter schools for traditional public schools, online learning for race-to-face teaching, and experienced, tenured teachers for Teach for America amateurs.

It must be noted that many of the fascinations of the reformists don't actually yield the same test score results as traditional approaches. But as long as a reformist can point to at least one, he can crow about "knowing what works."
 
So what's wrong with all this?

To begin with, an edu-bubble driven by test scores is most likely to produce schools that are, back to Keiler, "little more than test-preparation institutes, ignoring subjects and skills that are not assessed, with faculty members who resent and distrust one another."

And whereas the dot-com bubble ruined Silicon Valley, and the housing bubble ruined the American economy, the edu-bubble will destroy our nation's future. Our children's education has such profound consequences on what their adulthood will be like. And when the edu-bubble bursts, as it most certainly will, there's apt to be a whole generation that will have been robbed of its potential well-being. Do you think having iPhones will compensate for that?

h/t Jeff Bryant

Stephen Krashen Explains Stuff About Testing, Poverty

Prof. Stephen Krashen 12-08-2011 from Chicago Teachers Union on Vimeo.

Governor Jerry Brown Returns Stupid Bill To Senate Along With Letter -- Ouch

SB 547 Veto Message