One Ineffective Teacher

[Chris_Wendt]

Suffolk teacher refuses to submit evidence against himself (link). Intentionally gets rated ineffective. He is certified to teach college-level courses in high school, and in most or all other respects is an excellent teacher.

As you read the story in Newsday, I think it is important to pay attention to the side issues reported concerning the APPR implementation, and not just focus on this one teacher's tilting at windmills.

Here, I was going to provide a link to the massive Wantagh APPR Plan, to give you an idea of how tortured is the process of teacher evaluations, not out there somewhere, but right here in our own community. Well, that is not going to be possible, as you will see when you follow the link to APPR on the district website. Try this at home:www.wantaghschools.org/site/Default.aspx?PageID=582, click on [APPR]

Shaking my head....

Chris Wendt

[rr]

Chris,

I don't mean to come off sounding insensitive and I certainly think teachers, good teachers, are a very valuable commodity but I just don't understand the point of this post. Are you highlighting the plight of the teacher here? Are we supposed to take up arms in defense of teachers and principals, as per your earlier post?

Nobody is coming to my aid when I don't think my evaluation is unfair, nobody is writing articles in defense of my work ethics. You know what happens if I get evaluated as ineffective by my company...I get laid off, regardless of how fair or unfair I deem the process is. I have no union representation to fight for me, no newspaper articles and nobody posting in support of my job.

Personally, as I've said in the past, if teachers or principals don't like the evaluations take it up with your union representation, that's partly why the union exists aside from collecting dues from the teachers and being a roadblock for change. But don't ask me, the taxpayer, to come to your aid when you're not satisfied with your evaluation, with your raises, with your pension, your vacation schedule or the rigorous common core that's been forced down your throat.

I get the differences between private sector and public and I know it's unpopular to say aloud or write but maybe if our schools were run in a more business-like manner, not run like a business - a business-like manner, we would see some better results for our very valuable tax dollars. Shareholders in a business expect results, if employees in said company are no longer able to keep up...well they're gone and if the results still aren't coming the leadership is replaced. It's called a merit based system, those that are good move up and those that are bad move out. There's no tenure system based on time-served or how you performed years ago, no guaranteed anything, you contribute or you leave and if you don't like it you have the right to leave on your own.

I suggest that any teachers that feel it's unfair to be evaluated based on a system that their union representation agreed to, perhaps it's time to remove union leadership or leave the profession, there are literally hundred waiting to take your job. Let's stop shuffling ineffective teachers and stop kidding ourselves that all teachers are "in it for the kids". Most are, but the few that aren't have soured the patch - I'm not talking about Wantagh here, I'm talking the system in general. I've had unbelievably good experiences this year with my kids teachers and I think they are great and I think despite all the hurdles the have to jump through they're doing good and will be evaluated as such.

I find myself shaking my head at the steady stream of posts from you in regards to how unfair the evaluation process is, to me it seems unbelievably fair...perhaps a dose of real-world is required to show how fair it really is. I'm sure someone may try to turn this post into a negative perspective on teachers - it's NOT...great teachers should get great pay and benefits, bad ones should not be protected by the system.

[Chris_Wendt]

I issued no call to action in this post. Please consider it informational. But please do read and make note of the tangential problems cited in the Newsday article.

I also have to wonder why the Wantagh Board of Ed suppressed the district's APPR Plan from the website. As I recall, this was a monstrous 500+ page Plan! I guess you could call that the new version of "transparency": you click on the link and the thing just disappears...you can see right through it!

Not really, though, is it? 500-plus pages of...
...wasted effort?

Any how, to the point raised by rr, this is a very complicated issue.

I am sure this teacher did not act alone, without consultation or counsel with his union, perhaps with NYSUT, and probably with his or their lawyers.

Discarding a tenured teacher certified to teach college level coursework in high school with 15 years of good service to his credit...

...that would not serve your children well at all.

I believe we are looking at the tip of the proverbial iceberg concerning high stakes testing, opting-out, and general discontent over the performance of the Regents and NYSED. That is just an opinion, but I think more than just a few people share that opinion.

Chris Wendt