Making Sense of Michelle Rhee's Legacy and Teacher "Churn and Burn"
If you haven't read it already, I highly recommend Washington Post reporter Bill Turque's analysis of Michelle Rhee's legacy one year after she left the D.C. public schools. Turque writes about the "churn and burn" in the D.C. teacher corps since the introduction of the controversial new IMPACT teacher evaluation and merit pay system: One-third of all teachers on the payroll in September 2007 no longer work for the district, and inexperienced teachers are more clustered than ever in low-income schools and neighborhoods. We know this is problematic because DC's own data shows that 22 percent of teachers with six to 10 years of experience are rated "highly effective," compared to just 12 percent of teachers with less than six years experience.
That said, if inexperienced but minimally-competent teachers are replacing grossly incompetent ones, the high turnover might be a better option than leaving bad teachers in the classroom. In the case of D.C., is that what's
