Written by Candi Peterson, WTU General Vice President
DC Public Schools Chancellor Kaya Henderson issued “You’re fired letters" this past week to 206 DC teachers. Before DC teachers knew of their own fate, the mainstream media had received a lengthy DCPS press packet on Friday, July 15 from the Office of the Chancellor (OOC) lauding teacher terminations and celebrating highly effective teachers eligible for merit pay.Bill Turque, staff writer for the Washington Post reported on the details of the DCPS firings as early as July 15. Turquewrote: “Of the 206 fired, D.C. officials said, 65 were rated ineffective this year and 141 were judged minimally effective for the second consecutive year, triggering dismissal.” An additional twenty-one teachers who were effective and/or highly effective were also terminated byDCPS because they could not find a permanent placement.
Friday's teacher firings are a continuation of Michelle Rhee's educational plan to terminate a significant share
Below is a post from a teacher, "No Confidence," from another thread but I read it and said bingo! (Emphasis mine.)
I think that the first change that could make some difference would be for teacher & administrators to understand the limits of their abilities to assess. At least the teacher could say, Sally is learning differently than many other kids I see and we don't know why. Johnny is refusing to do writing assignments and we don't know why.
Next I think that PD should include training about learning & developmental differences, with case studies, to
You’ve got to be wondering what a teacher like me is doing marching against the “reform” trends. For those of you unfamiliar with my background, I graduated with a degree in Computer Science from Syracuse University. A year later, after 6-8 months of unemployment and a stint as a data entry person at an educational database firm, I went into the NYC Teaching Fellows program, an offshoot of Michelle Rhee’s New Teacher Project. On the surface, I’m a perfect candidate to follow the corporatist thinking about education, and should be easily molded into the dominant thinking from elites who ostensibly believe they’re going into education for the common good. All it takes is the right amount of fear, the right amount of frustration, the right amount of ignorance, and the right amount of failure to tip people into the hands of those who wish to rotate our profession backwards.
Fortunately for me, I lucked out. And if you’re reading this, I’m thinking the same goes for you.
You see, I teach at a school that, somewhere along the line, decided to value veteran leadership and collaboration. They fostered a culture of discussion and unity that stems from decades of hardship from a neighborhood and administration standpoint. As leaders changed and gangs ran the block, teachers fortified the
OUR BROKEN ESCALATORBy NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF. Op-Ed Columnist in the NY Times | http://nyti.ms/nm6gio July 17 , 2011 - YAMHILL, Ore. -- THE United States supports schools in Afghanistan because we know that education is one of the cheapest and most effective ways to build a ...
FLORIDA CHARTER SCHOOLS’ MANY F’s GIVE AMMUNITION TO CRITICS: Charters were seven times more likely than regular public schools to receive F's on state's report cardBy Dave Weber, Orlando Sentinel | http://thesent.nl/qgYvwF 4:26 PM EDT, July 16, 2011 - Charter schools, which account for only a fraction of the state's public schools, received half of all the F's when the state handed out its annual letter grades two ...
bigeducationape.blogspot.com - Schools Matter: What school is all aboutWhat school is all aboutby skrashenSent to the Los Angeles Times, July 17, 2011In addition to influencing the medical literature (LA Times, July 16), J.K. Ro...
bigeducationape.blogspot.com - Yong Zhao » BlogDitch Testing: Lessons from the Cheating Scandal in Atlanta (Part 1)[14 Jul 2011 | 5 Comments | 2,146]Ditch Testing: Lessons from the Cheating Scandal in Atlanta (Part 1)Last week a...
huffingtonpost.com - Carlsbad, CA -- Tonight at the "All Things Digital" conference sponsored by the Wall Street Journal, Rupert Murdoch -- Chairman of News Corp, new WSJ owner, and longtime torchbearer for conservativ...
lacrossetribune.com - There has been much chatter — on both the local and national level — about charter schools. There is also a lot of misinformation out there, too. Unlike their public counterparts, privately run cha...
michaelklonsky.blogspot.com - This NYT editorial "Hold the line on school reform," harks back to the days when they were calling for the invasion of Iraq to get rid of those "weapons of mass destruction." In other words, the T...
nytimes.com - A cheating scandal in which scores of teachers and principals in Atlanta’s public schools falsified student test results has thrown the system into chaos and made its name synonymous with fraud. Th...
nytimes.com - MILLBURN, N.J. — Matthew Stewart believes there is a place for charter schools. Just not in his schoolyard. Mr. Stewart, a stay-at-home father of three boys, moved to this wealthy towns...
bigeducationape.blogspot.com - Is thinking differently the new “wrong”? - Arlington, VA, United States, ASCD EDge Blog postIs thinking differently the new “wrong”?Walter’s blog archive: http://surfaquarium.com/blog.htmMi...
blogtalkradio.com - History will be made this Tuesday night, July 19, at 9 PM EDT. Join us as we welcome Matthew's mom, Karen Sprowal as she takes us through the Kafkaesque hell she went through as she took on Harlem ...
washingtonpost.com - What, after all these years, did we learn from “Harry Potter”? That miracles can happen, at least to: *A single mother named J.K. Rowling who was living on public assistance and didn’t give up on h...
businessinsider.com - Rupert and James Murdoch will not be appearing before British Parliament to face questioning over the phone-hacking allegations rocking News Corps empire. Rebekah Brooks will. Earlier this week it ...
reuters.com - By Joseph Ax and Noeleen Walder NEW YORK | Fri Jul 15, 2011 6:12pm EDT NEW YORK (Reuters) - When Joel Klein stepped down from running New York City's schools last year to head the education divisio...
nypost.com - The government gravy train just keeps rolling for the contractor at the center of the massive CityTime payroll scandal. Virginia-based Science Applications International Corp. won two more federal ...
nytimes.com - LONDON — As a textbook example of how not to manage the relationship between private industry and the academy, Deutsche Bank’s agreement with two leading German universities to sponsor their joint ...
bigeducationape.blogspot.com - CHARTER SCHOOL SCANDALSAbramson Science and Technology Charter School *"Records show glaring faults at school with ties to Turkish charter network.”* Times-Picayune (LA) 7/15/2011 Inci Akpinar, the...
zhaolearning.com - A Bold Education Experiment: What We Should Learn From China World’s longest high-speed rail networks, fastest trains, fastest computer, second largest economy, and #1 standing in international tes...
blog.oregonlive.com - When Bill Travis called friend Cornelia Welch one evening in 1978, her slurred speech was a clear sign something was wrong. She never drank alcohol, Travis knew. So he called her only son, Claxton ...
womensenews.org - As Nina transitions into Nick, he discovers the space between being a man and a woman. In this excerpt from his book, "Nina Here Nor There," he describes a similar journey undertaken by his friend ...
bigeducationape.blogspot.com - SACRAMENTO PROGRESSIVE ALLIANCE: Van Jones on What We Can Learn From the Tea PartyVan Jones on What We Can Learn From the Tea Partyby Paul BFriday 8 July 2011by: Amy Dean, Truthout | InterviewVan J...
bigeducationape.blogspot.com - 4LAKids - some of the news that doesn't fit: CONSERVATIVES BEGIN EFFORT TO REPEAL CALIFORNIA’S GAY HISTORY LAWCONSERVATIVES BEGIN EFFORT TO REPEAL CALIFORNIA’S GAY HISTORY LAW BY ON TOP MAGAZINE ST...
dissenter.firedoglake.com - There will be much more to report on this on Monday, but here is some news on the prisoner hunger strike at Pelican Bay. The Prisoner Hunger Strike Solidarity (PHSS) coalition reports:This afternoo...
bigeducationape.blogspot.com - SACRAMENTO PROGRESSIVE ALLIANCE: Van Jones on What We Can Learn From the Tea PartyVan Jones on What We Can Learn From the Tea Partyby Paul BFriday 8 July 2011by: Amy Dean, Truthout | InterviewVan J...
bigeducationape.blogspot.com - Do Americans understand the debt crisis? - The Answer Sheet - The Washington PostDo Americans understand the debt crisis?By Valerie StraussHow well do Americans understand the complexities of the n...
schooltechconnect.com - Whether you're going to the SOS March or not, there's something very smart and productive you can do this week to help save our schools, and that is to contact your member of congress with a specif...
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