Cairo Association of Teachers - Newsletter

CAT Tracks for May 11, 2008 "BUMPING RIGHTS"

Ooh, a rant leapt to my fingertips...and passed.

The editorial by Julia Steiny is presented below to once again prove that CAT Tracks WILL present articles on both sides of the education divide...the unvarnished wisdom and truth of folks with whom I can relate...BUT...also, "the dark side!"

As for Julia Steiny's views on the evils of "seniority" and the need to abolish it in all its forms and fashions to save "good teachers" and education...we will agree to disagree!

Sorry, Julia...there is NO WAY to implement a "fair" system...a system that truly - WITHOUT BIAS - identifies the "excellent" teacher, allowing THAT excellent teacher to be saved from the evils of dreaded teachers' unions!

Take the "teacher of the year"...a sham in itself. I've seen the inner workings of such systems during my association with labor unions...as practiced by "friendlies". I've also seen numerous examples the abuse of evaluations during my Cairo tenure. (Thank, God, for tenure, without which I would NOT be "celebrating" my 39th year in the Cairo Public Schools. My ass would have been fired many, many years ago. I'll let you, dear reader, decide whether that would have been a good thing or a bad thing. I'm having a difficult enough time deciding for myself!)

"Teacher of the year" awards, whether selected by the administration or unions are typically nothing but "beauty contests". A teacher (who may well be worthy, but often not) seeking recognition for whatever personal or financial motivation. For every self-promoter, there are literally dozens of colleagues who toil unnoticed in the trenches trying to find a way to impart knowledge to their charges. And, yes, these "nonseekers of glory" may well be the ones that Julia Steiny wants to get rid of in order to provide a job for some Johnny or Janey come lately. Again, a disclaimer, many of the winners of these "beauty contests" ARE worthy! But, that does NOT automatically mean that they are any better than the folks that work side-by-side with them.

And...in Cairo - Past, Present, and ???

Currently on tenure in Cairo School District Number One is a teacher who was rated EXCELLENT by her immediate supervisor PRIOR to one of our many teacher strikes, er, "work stoppages". Following her 15-minute appearance on a picket line (before it was brought to our attention and we yanked her off) - an activity that was protected by law - she became UNSATISFACTORY in the eyes of that same administrator...and was fired! Do you really think that I would place any credence whatsoever in the "evaluations" of the administration?

Readers of CAT Tracks have already read my numerous (and wholly justified) rants concerning the treatment of Lorenzo Nelson and James Gibson...two employees praised by their immediate supervisors for the excellence of their work...UNTIL!

And, for any naysayers out there, I'll give you incontrovertible PROOF POSITIVE of the fallacy of evaluations by the administration. If you feel that Ron Newell doesn't have a clue what he is talking about...that Ron Newell is a PRIME EXAMPLE of the evils of seniority...well, then, stick this, er, in your pipe and smoke it. As I conclude my 39th year as a teacher in Cairo School District Number One, I can state with truth...and proof if necessary...that I have received nothing by EXCELLENT evaluations from a multitude of supervisors! No brag, just fact.

You may say...

Hey, that proves that administrators are fair and impartial! They rated YOU excellent even though you have been a vocal critic of policy and procedures...so, there!

My response...

I don't know what it proves...other that the evaluation system is a sham. There were times (early in my career) when I may have been worthy of a rating of excellence...loooooooooooong before "differentiated instruction" and the variety of learning styles were discovered. Loooooooooooong before students could not be expected to sit in a chair and be quiet and attentive...and not curse out teacher...and not throw the security aide through the trophy case. However, during my latter years, the anointment as "excellent" was totally undeserved...and the reason for my volunteering to end my career in the Crisis Classroom (a.k.a "Alternative School").

The latest gimmick by administrators (and those like Julia Steiny who would trumpet fair and impartial means of evaluation) is to base evaluations on "objective criteria"...like TEST SCORES! I mean, who could argue with that...isn't that why we are all here...why we are paid "the big bucks"?

Well, consider who "has the power" to stack the deck?

If I were administrator (a.k.a. GOD) for a day, I'd simply sit down for a few minutes during the summer...find the teacher who I don't like (who I want to get rid of) and give him/her every underachieving, ADHD, and special needs student on the list. All of the "good students" - well behaved students who are already meeting and/or exceeding state standards - would be placed in the classroom of my "favored" teacher. If I'm REALLY pissed at John or Jane Doe teacher "that I don't like", remember that I control discipline in the building as well. When the teacher I like sends a student to the office...immediate suspension. When the teacher I don't like sends a student to the office...we'll have a chat...might even share a Coke and a candy bar while we're chatting...about what a hard-ass Mr./Ms. so-and-so is...and a racist too! Folks...it is EASY to make or break a teacher. THAT is why there is seniority and tenure...to protect employees against incompetent and/or immoral employers/supervisors.

I could go on, and on, and on...

So, Julia Steiny...to paraphrase the immortal John Wayne from the movie, McClintock...concerning whether to unleash yet another rant..."I won't, I won't, the hell I won't!"

Didn't solve a thing...won't change a thing...but, as usual, it makes me feel better!

Hey, this might get me through the next SIXTEEN SCHOOL DAYS!

Steiny: Seniority ‘bumping’ of teachers creates havoc in schools

By Julia Steiny

In 2004, Providence named a beloved biology teacher, John Wemple, Teacher of the Year. In the spring of that year, Amgen Corp. gave Wemple a $10,000 award for science teaching excellence. But shortly after, Providence laid him off from his job at Classical High. He’d been “bumped” by a teacher who had the right, thanks to state law, to displace a colleague with less seniority in the system. Wemple’s widely acknowledged merit counted for squat. A tony private school snapped him up.

The message to the kids is that the silly grownups can’t tell the difference between an excellent or indifferent teacher, or that they don’t care who teaches the kids. Forget science; seniority-driven school systems teach cynicism.

Last year at Times2 Academy, a district-charter school in Providence, 14 of the 18 elementary teachers were bumped out and replaced with teachers that the charter’s home district no longer needed because of declining enrollment. The time and resources spent on professional development, team-building and cultivating those bumped teachers just went down the tubes. Times2 leaders had to start all over again building the school’s culture. Devastating. And in the service of what?

“Bumping” is only one of several educationally pernicious personnel practices left over from the factory-model labor contracts that depress the quality of Rhode Island schools. Factory-model contracts treat teachers as interchangeable. It doesn’t matter whose hand is on the educational die press. What matters is their date of hire.

Most other states are further along in the process of professionalizing teachers. Rhode Island General Law 16-13-6 states that when the student population declines, teachers must be laid off “in the inverse order of their employment,” and rehired, when possible, according to their seniority in the system. Period. Merit is not an issue.

Last October in Providence, the East Side Parents Education Coalition hosted an education forum with the elected officials from the greater East Side. To everyone’s surprise the officials all came — from the state Senate, House and City Council. The conversation was temperate until the subject of bumping heated up the room. A parent recounted the John Wemple story, leading others to share their experiences of having some marvelous teacher yanked out of the classroom, often replaced by someone distinctly inferior.

Parents waxed so hot at the session that both Rep. Gordon Fox and Sen. Rhoda Perry agreed to submit legislation to end the practice of bumping.

However, the two bills appear to be languishing in the legislature, at least partly because neither offers a clean, clear solution.

I consulted the Business Education Partnership, the go-to people for understanding Rhode Island education’s labor contracts. They have four reports on the state’s teacher contracts that propose solutions to each of the problems they identify, including bumping. (Available at www.edpartnership.org)

For openers, BEP’s chief analyst, Lisa Blais, said, “There is no one bad guy here. There’s a culture of the way we do business that prevents us from getting what we need. Across the nation, districts complain that seniority does not work in the interests of the kids. Unions complain that administration doesn’t know what they’re doing. Both have a point. So our concept is to acknowledge fundamental practices like seniority and tenure, and to work with them instead of trying to bury them.”

To professionalize education personnel practices, Blais and her colleagues put the focus squarely on evaluation. Rhode Island is one of only a handful of states that do not mandate that teachers be evaluated. In fact, most Rhode Island teachers are never evaluated in any meaningful or helpful way.

Blais says the key to an effective and fair evaluation system is to use several different measures, instead of just one principal’s say-so. Evaluations should include objective, quantifiable information, such as student achievement, as well as administrator and peer observations. The resulting evaluations should place teachers at one of four levels: master, pre-master, basic and below basic.

With these categories in hand, teachers would no longer be interchangeable. Any teacher with two consecutive below-basic evaluations could be let go. (At last!) No basic teacher could bump a master, no matter how long he or she has been in the system. Only master teachers should be peer evaluators.

In other words, let’s develop standards that have teeth. The state’s official teacher standards are fine, but in practice they are treated as nice, ignorable guidelines and not as the foundations for rigorous evaluation. Distinguishing between the lazy and the committed, between the well-informed and the limited, between those who speak clear English and those who are poor communicators, would go a long way toward dismantling factory-model schools. This BEP recommendation is right on the money.

That said, however, developing evaluation systems takes time. In the meantime, Rhode Island could pass a very simple law stating that all teachers should be hired professionally — matched to the job via an interview and resumé or portfolio in hand — and that no teacher, however senior, is owed any job other than as a substitute teacher. If enrollment declines, the “excessed” teacher automatically becomes a substitute — until landing a more permanent position. That way the schools stay stable, and the teacher’s livelihood is intact. Yes, an “excessed” top-step teacher will be more expensive than regular subs. But that would be far less expensive than the wasteful havoc seniority and bumping are currently causing. If no school wants the “excessed” teacher for a permanent position, it shouldn’t be the kids, parents and school that suffer.

The BEP’s idea is better than mine — more respectful, more professional — but the state needs to end bumping immediately. The kids and parents can’t afford it; the quality of the state’s education can’t afford it. So legislators need to work on those bills and see to it they get passed.

We need to assure people like John Wemple they can confidently take jobs in our public-school classrooms and trust that their merits will be valued.

Julia Steiny, a former member of the Providence School Board, consults for government agencies and schools; she is co-director of Information Works!, Rhode Island’s school-accountability project. She can be reached at juliasteiny@cox.net , or c/o EdWatch, The Providence Journal, 75 Fountain St., Providence, RI 02902.