wnyc.org / 93.9fm / am 820

What started to come out, nicely, in this show was a truism about Teach for America which is rarely reported.

TFA is really more about improving a bunch of educated middle/upper class folks than it is about improving our nation's schools or their pupils.

The TFA fellows get a year or two in our nation's troubled schools, which is a terrific experience for them. But then they take those experiences out into the world.

Don't get me wrong -- that's a good thing. But it should be understood that TFA isn't really about helping out our troubled schools.

Is it verifiably true that 'most students are being failed by America's schools'? Or is it more subtle than that?

The problem is the FACT that even in the realm of Genuis', 9/10 of them are IDIOTS. This seems to
hold true in all walks of life and all efforts of work. The tragedy is that incompetent teachers influence hundreds of children daily.

discipline yes. but it is an oversimplification to say that students under perform exclusively because teachers are not up to the task or not entertaining. Often in difficult settings, students are not ready to be in a school environment. Even the best teacher can not benefit a student in a classroom without the appropriate mind set on the part of the student. It can be done, but real change should happen at the youngest level. We accept too much negative behaviour throughout the students education.

comments in yesterday blog:
http://tednellen.blogspot.com/2010/01/educate-to-innovate-huh.html

cheers, ted

1. Ms Ripley seems to take a position very much in favor of school administrators, and contra most teachers.
So many principals and APs decide [often on a whimsical moment's notice] that a teacher is doing something that they deem incompetence, and the teacher is shipped off to a rubber room. Teachers, sitting there, are never told what they have done; this precludes formulating any sort of defense. Just as instantaneously, a teacher can be returned to full duties in the classroom, absolved of the non-existent charges.

2. Pegging teacher assessment to student test scores is quite absurd. Many students, particularly English Language Learners, need upwards of 7 years [according to Stephen Krashen] until they overcome their 'silent' period. If a teacher gets to work with a student [who has arrived here at age 15] for less than 4 years [as in a HS] why would teachers then be punished for helping students progress, but not enough to pass the English Regents?

3. A teacher knows when success is taking place: the students have a gleam of excitement. Administrators are flummoxed because they cannot quantify this.

I was a public school science teacher for two years and have been a full time tutor since 2004.

As a tutor, I am quite successful. I have helped individual students go from reading far below grade level, to reading at level. I have helped students overcome debilitating math anxiety and actually become quite confident and successful in math. Parents not only pay a lot of money for my services but also often thank me profusely, even embarrassing.

As a classroom teacher, I was a failure. There is no other word for it. I failed, failed, failed. My students did not learn much at all and they did not learn much because I could not manage my classes. (Yes, I taught in some pretty rough schools.) My lesson plans were often excellent, but that didn't matter because I didn't teach them often enough- I was too busy trying to put out fires.

I think the evidence suggests that I could have been a good teacher, even an excellent teacher. But I wasn't. Going into rough, poorly run schools with absolutely zero support is a situation that will promote failure. Sure, some amazing, wonderful people will manage to be great teachers despite this situation, but they are the exception rather than the rule.

Teachers should be held to high standards. They should also be given regular constructive criticism and high quality mentoring to give them a reasonable chance of success. Some excellent teachers are born, but we don't have enough of them. We also need to make great teachers.

yes, and student's "life satisfaction" matters. Children who come from difficulties at home and live in poverty, need support in and out of school. They may develop self confidence after becoming more competent, but their sense of self worth over-rides everything. Teachers can do that if they not only focus on the standardized tests.

I've had plenty of wonderful college professors at excellent state schools and even a local community college. Why have I have fewer excellent teachers in public schools?

Merit pay will not simply "reward" good teachers. It will result in teachers teaching toward the test and even falsifying or unethically influencing students' answers. Increasing the pay overall for educators will make the field more competitive.

Teacher preparation is essential. Although economically unfeasible, new teachers would be hugely helped if they could teach their first year with a master teacher.

What about teacher mentoring? What about teacher training while on the job? There are 70,000 teachers in New York City alone. How many of them could be great.
As an employer will tell you, it's management working with their employers that count. Teachers are thrown into class and told to do!
Let's not look for genuiuses. Let's look to improve a teacher's performance by good management.

The research of Dr. Martin Haberman (The Haberman Foundation) has found quite the opposite of TFA's own reasearch: passionate, bright young men and women who come from similar backgrounds as their disenfranchised students have the most significant and lasting impact--academically and emotionally.

The counter-intuitive findings that the guest has been explaining is profound -- and counter to the feel-good, Hollywood-influenced culture -- you know, all those cloying, saccherine-filled Robin Williams movies -- that we believe in and accept, because these myths have become practically the air we breathe.

This is a great segment!

Yes, teachers make a difference -- but until the "experts" and the politicians get over their fear of tackling the issue of student preparation prior to school -- i.e., what goes on in the home, the family background, none of this teacher evaluation nonsense makes any sense or is in any way useful.

You mentioned earlier that teachers must use their time efficiently in order to be effective teachers. Teachers often face resistance from their students, ie behavioral issues, students not interested in learning, etc, so teachers use a lot of their time "discipling"their students. How should a teacher tackle such issues in order to be a effective?

Classroom management is a HUGE part of being an effective teacher. Please say more on this topic.

I taught for almost 2 years in a juvenille detention center in nyc and almost 2 years running a GED program on the lower east side.

regarding evaluations and observations -- the most important part of the package is for a principal to come in and say give the folders for john, steve, and bill -- they'll see the work you put in (worksheets created, homework, test, essay questions) and the real (not snapshot, kid's behavior dependent snapshot of an observation) work you've elicited from students

I am a Teacher Superviser for Teach For America for Fordham University and I think that the support that the fledgling teachers get is very variable. When they are floundering esp in Charter Schools where there are lots of young teachers and teachers who have never taught the curriculum before, it can be a very daunting situation, and the students in these classes are NOT benefitting from the enthusiasm and intelligence of these young teachers.

The idea of tying teacher performance to their salary is unbelievably hypocritical given the fact that we've just bailed out an entire industry (Wall St.) which performed so badly that it nearly caused a global economic collapse. There are no doubt, horrible teachers, but they should be fired, period (just like all of those Wall St. workers should be fired as well). But teachers cannot save kids from the rotted social fabric in our country and it's ridiculous to think they can. It's easy to point the finger at teachers, but the reality is, we don't care at all about educating low income kids in this country. Why would we? Then they might actually start to question things. Low income kids are being trained to follow and consume, that is all. To pretend otherwise is a great act of dishonesty and an insult to the kids in our country who have no hope of a life outside of chronic un(der)employment and debt.

You shouldn't measure performance based on student results. You should measure based on execution of proven skills/behaviors by the teacher. There are way too many factors influencing whether or not a student scores well on a standardized test. The teacher is only one piece of the pie. While it's harder to evaluate this way, it's the only fair way to do it.

Good schools need good leaders that encourage teachers to collaborate and learn from each other.

Also, schools need for staff to have a common set of beliefs that they develop together.

Too often, schools keep throwing new curricula ideas and programs at teacher without involving the teachers in choosing them.

What about remembering students' names? How important is this for classroom management and control? Do teachers need or get any training in this area?

test scores are potentially useful only for math and basic english -- most subjects, including visual and performing arts as well as academic courses, have no standardized tests. blows my mind that this keeps coming up. also, what about critical thinking, ethics, etc -- things hard to put a number on but which teachers should be giving to students. (I'm a high school teacher)

I just caught a smattering of the show, about teacher pay being linked to merit. I worked for over 20 years as a school secretary in a great elem. school in Manhattan, and I was horrified at some of the things I saw goiong on. How can a teacher expect to teach anything when she's trying to control a child who should not be in her class but the parents insist on mainstreaming children with whatever kind of learning disability, who is running around with a scissor in his hands. Have problems like these been taken into consideration? It's not always the teachers' fault, sometimes they just are not allowed to teach. Thank you

When TFA recruits on college campuses, they market the program as something that will be great for the resume--help you get into law school, and so forth. Imagine the lasting impact the program could actually have if, instead of selecting bright young people who might do well for a couple years before moving on to make more money in another field, they selected bright young people who had an actual interest in remaining in the field.

Any performance pay must be based on percentage of improvement so that teachers are not rewarded merely for being assigned already high performing students. Most middle class parents do NOT want this because it might motivate the best teachers to teach lowest performing students and not their own children.

Do you think that part of this great teachers success is the fact that he is a male teacher in a classroom where there is most likely a lack of male role models?
Is there any data on this?

Ripley should also check out This American Life's piece on the Rubber Room in 2008. Teachers need to be paid better. It's a thankless job.

The reason teachers pushed to have the tests considered a factor EVALUATING TENURE was because the tests are a bit of a fraud. I'm an engineer and grew up in the nyc public schools and I can tell you all the memorizing that the Regents science tests require don't help when you get to college.

Given all the shenanigans that go one with standardized tests, I'm surprised everyone is so willing to attach a teachers' life to it.

I feel Amanda's comments are a bit easy to make as they fit into the general blaming of teachers for the poor performance of school systems. I'd be interested in her comments on the notion of professional community which has been found by the Chicago Consortium of school research associated with the University of Chicago which shows that teachers must have strong communities, including say in the direction of the school if you want to raise student achievement.

It seems that your data is largely short-term. What if the charismatic teachers don't raise test scores, but foster self-efficacy and improve self-confidence. Might that be a stronger predictor of long-term success in and out of school

please tell us what else makes a good teacher besides organization.....

What specific changes must be made by the teachers unions to make teachers better?

And, at the turn of the Century much of the efficiencies in argiculuture and farming were developed via pilot programs by the USDA, which dropped the percentage of income spent by americans on food.

Are there really good pilot programs at work now?

As a teacher I believe that emotional intelligence and empathy are essential for teaching. A teacher must build relationships to facilitate trust. Trust creates an atmosphere that allows learning to occur. Students will not learn from a teacher they cannot trust.

Daniel's story isn't the first time I've heard about a good teacher being chased away by the administration. The teachers' unions don't like those individuals who threaten the status quo.

Please consider the lack of support teachers receive. A teacher is only one person. If admin, and society in general, does not support teachers, how can they be effective? So much is asked of teachers; to teach, to be social workers and nurses.

The greatest teacher I had was one who broke the conventional model of our public school curricula. She created a class, with a biology teacher, called Literature in the Environment, based around Walden, by Thoreau. We went camping, where we hiked and participated in a trust walk, engaged in group discussion in class, and took class outside often. The freedom from the strict NYSEDU standards allowed me to question the methods of all of my past teachers and those I've confronted since. She left the school two years later, forced out by the administration, and now works at a private Day School, as English department head and administrator. She is a model citizen.