U.S. DOE smoke and mirror tricks, and teachers as scapegoats.

Readers in today's New York Times I found the following request from a respected colleague, and friend Joanne Yatvin. She suggests the following invitation to dialogue on teacher evaluation in the NY Times: Before I share my response to her invitation that I forwarded to the NY Times please read her respectful request:

Invitation to a Dialogue: Evaluating Teachers

Over the past year states have scrambled to rewrite their teacher evaluation procedures to satisfy federal demands. Because the main thrust of the new procedures is to remove ineffective teachers and, perhaps, reward superior ones, their key element is “value added” test scores — measuring how much students’ scores have improved.

To the Editor:

But they are also stuffed with multiple observations, often by different observers, long lists of criteria and lengthy written reviews. So freighted, they are not only unfair but also unworkable. There must be a better way.

What schools need are not only simpler and more flexible plans, but also evaluators with enough time and the expertise to do the job. At the elementary level, finding them should be relatively easy: appoint good principals and free them from bus duty and never-ending out-of-school meetings. In high schools, where principals have large numbers of teachers and numerous subject areas under their supervision, the evaluators should be department heads.

As for the evaluation process itself, it needs to be yearlong, with evaluators working alongside teachers and observing many different lessons. Thus, they will see what good teachers do: grading papers at lunchtime, coming in early to tutor a struggling student, staying late to meet with a worried parent, inspiring students to learn more than required.

Primarily, however, states would do well to abandon their obsession with student test scores. As many critics have observed, too many factors beyond a teacher’s control influence those numbers.

But an even bigger problem is teaching to the test. With so much weight given to the scores in new evaluations, only a few brave teachers will be able to resist concentrating on tests. As a result, real student learning will decline sharply, along with good teaching.

JOANNE YATVIN 
Portland, Ore., March 13, 2012

Joanne Yatvin is a retired teacher and elementary school principal and past president of the National Council of Teachers of English.

Editors’ Note: We invite readers to respond to this letter for our Sunday Dialogue. We plan to publish responses and Ms. Yatvin’s rejoinder in the Sunday Review. E-mail: letters@nytimes.com

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/14/opinion/invitation-to-a-dialogue-evaluating-teachers.html?emc=tnt&tntemail1=y

My response sent to the N.Y. Times was:

Rather than have a dialogue on teacher evaluation I rather have a dialogue on evaluating the United States Department of Education landmark "No Child Left Behind/Race To The Top" federal policy.

It appears to me that the U.S. Department of Education is playing Smoke and Mirrors, and is looking for a scapegoat to defer blame from their failed polices.   We should ask ourselves why is the U.S. DOE in a rush to include valued added assessments in the form of test scores? Lets have a quick NCLB review. NCLB promised that it could close the achievement gap by mandating new rigorous standards, and annual testing. A decade later perhaps it is time that we evaluate the United States Department of Education reform policy using those very same valued added assessments they are recommending be used for teachers? Well our NAEP scores for 2009 17-years olds have been relatively flat since 1971. Andrew J. Coulson, the director of the Cato Institute Center for Educational Freedom, reflecting on those flat scores states in his review: “The latest NAEP results reveal a productivity collapse unparalleled in any other sector of the economy. At the end of high school, students perform no better today than they did nearly 40 years ago, and yet we spend more than twice as much per pupil in real, inflation-adjusted terms. I can’t think of any other service that has gotten worse during my lifetime.”

There is that well known biblical verse about those that "Live by the sword shall die by the sword" well when does the US DOE fall on it's own sword. After all after a decade of reform dominance clearly No Child Left Behind and Race To The Top/ are the status quo. Seriously what other education reform policy is completing with NCLB/RTTT? The U.S. DOE has led the show for over a decade, using 1.2 trillion dollars allocated under NCLB to dictate education reform at the state level. So states do what the U.S. DOE wants, or risk losing your federal funding. The Federal Government has cornered the market on education reform with punitive measures rooted in their high stakes test driven mandates under their promise that all children in grades 3 to 8 will be proficient at grade level in reading, writing, and math by the end of 2013.
NCLB allocated 1.2 trillion dollars for that purpose, and attached numerous strings to federal allocations through new state mandated standards and assessments requirements. We are less than two years away from that promise delivery date, and nearly a trillion dollars is spent on their promise. Shouldn’t someone be evaluating the promise of NCLB? NCLB allocations amounts to roughly about 10% of what we spend on our public schools. The other 90% comes from local and state funding. So roughly NCLB has spent nearly a trillion dollars thus far with the states adding nearly another 9 trillion. 

Rather than asking to discuss evaluating teachers we should be asking to evaluate NCLB’s promise? Just when do we ask what does the United State Department of Education have to show for their efforts?

Certainly no real improvement in 17-year olds NAEP scores, or SAT scores indicate this critical data point: reading scores in 1972 were 530, and today after a decade of NCLB reading scores are at 497. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SAT - cite_note-06Report-21)  

I guess it is too much to expect that the U.S. DOE in DC would be willing to fall on their own high stakes data sword. 

We also have the Reading First Schools failure. Secretary Rod Paige and Secretary Margaret Spelling advocated, and pushed Reading First Schools as the DOE's showcase models of reform. For the first six years of NCLB the U.S. DOE awarded over 6 billion dollars to public schools that adopted their recommended Gold Cadillac Scientifically Based Reading Programs and train all it's teachers to fully use these programs. Well after 6 years the U. S. 2008 Reading First Impact Study indicated that children in non Reading First Schools control groups had higher reading comprehension scores than Reading First School students. Certainly we should have started questioning federal leadership back then. They have a record of documented failure that should have been raising red flags long ago. 

The pathetic truth after spending nearly a trillion dollars, and mandating numerous fail attempts to close the achievement gap the U.S DOE is once again calling for new assessments and new standards. Someone tell Secretary of Education Arne Duncan "been there did that one Arne"?

Returning to my opening point about the U.S. DOE Smoke and Mirrors, and scapegoats we find United States Secretary Arne Duncan in need of a way to keep the public's eye off that DOE NCLB/RTTT massive failure to deliver on it's promise to close the achievement gap. Thus his new scapegoat becomes teacher evaluations and value added assessments that rely once again on high stakes testing.

Please people tell me you are not going to fall for Secretary of Education Duncan's Smoke and Mirror tricks? I do wonder if the buck ever stops at the top at the DOE in DC?

Jesse The Walking Man Turner

Children Are More Than Test Scores  
If you are wondering what the Walking man is listening today on his walk as he thinks about his coming trip to DC to join United Opt Out Occupy The DOE in DC it all Bruce Springsteen's "Rocky Ground" Man am I inspired: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kYUYnoWqct0
In case you want to sing long with me:

Singing those Rocky Ground lyrics
(I'm a soldier!)
We've been traveling over rocky ground, rocky ground
We've been traveling over rocky ground, rocky ground
We've been traveling over rocky ground, rocky ground
We've been traveling over rocky ground, rocky ground

Rise up shepherd, rise up
Your flock has roamed far from the hills
The stars have faded, the sky is still
The angels are shouting "Glory Hallelujah"

We've been traveling over rocky ground, rocky ground
We've been traveling over rocky ground, rocky ground

Forty days and nights of rain have washed this land
Jesus said the money changers in this temple will not stand
Find your flock, get them to higher ground
Flood waters rising and we're Caanan bound

We've been traveling over rocky ground, rocky ground
We've been traveling over rocky ground, rocky ground
(I'm a soldier!)

Tend to your flock or they will stray
We'll be called for our service come Judgment Day
Before we cross that river wide
Blood on our hands will come back on us twice

(I'm a soldier!)
Rise up shepherd, rise up
Your flock has roamed far from the hills
Stars have faded, the sky is still
Sun's in the heavens and a new day's rising

You use your muscle and your mind and you pray your best
That your best is good enough, the Lord will do the rest
You raise your children and you teach 'them to walk straight and sure
You pray that hard times, hard times, come no more
You try to sleep, you toss and turn, the bottom's dropping out
Where you once had faith now there's only doubt
You pray for guidance, only silence now meets your prayers
The morning breaks, you awake but no one's there

We've been traveling over rocky ground, rocky ground
There's a new day coming
We've been traveling over rocky ground, rocky ground
(I'm a soldier!)
We've been traveling over rocky ground, rocky ground
There's a new day coming
We've been traveling over rocky ground, rocky ground
(I'm a soldier!)
We've been traveling over rocky ground, rocky ground
There's a new day coming
We've been traveling over rocky ground, rocky ground
(I'm a soldier!)
We've been traveling over rocky ground, rocky ground
There's a new day coming
We've been traveling over rocky ground, rocky ground

We've been traveling over rocky ground, rocky ground
We've been traveling over rocky ground, rocky ground
We've been traveling over rocky ground, rocky ground
We've been traveling over rocky ground, rocky ground

Yeah I’m still walking, still marching, still talking, still blogging, and I’m coming Secretary of Education Status quo Arne Duncan.
I travel over rocky ground for over 10-years now,

Jesse The Walking Man Turner