The DOE has started their public relations campaign to vilify the ATRs by saying that they were discarded because of their lack of ability. Not ageism, not salary, and certainly not their knowledge to question stupid administrative dictates. According to the DOE, the ATRs are characterized by their lack of classroom ability. On the other hand, the DOE sees no problem when principals hire loads of cheap and inexperienced newbie teachers. despite documented classroom management and curriculum learning issues with these teachers. Education experts all know it takes a minimum of 3 to 5 years for a teacher to acquire the management and educational skills to handle the classroom. However, in the unreal world of the DOE, this seems to be ignored. In fact, the DOE actually encourages the principals to hire newbie teachers and uses the "fair student funding" program to make it difficult for principals to do otherwise.
This brings me to a simple question. "Would you want a novice surgeon or an experienced surgeon to operate on you or your child"? I would think the answer is obvious, the experienced surgeon. However, the DOE with their "children last" program and "education on the cheap" policy ignores what's best for the student. An experienced teacher can evaluate the various learning styles of her students and can most effectively get the most out of a child's developing brain. By contrast, the DOE seems to want newbie teachers that must follow a steep learning curve to develop as a teacher and are encouraged to use a failed one-program-fits-all curriculum model. Is it any wonder that despite the emphasis on test preparation over a more complete education, the NYC students have shown no improvement on the federal tests?
Only Tweed and their media lackeys, cannot see that it is more important to have a high quality experienced teacher in the classroom than an inexperienced novice teacher. Until the DOE disregards their failed ideology and bring the best teachers back into the classrooms, look for flat test scores to continue.
Haven't ATRs been rated Satisfactorially by their principals for all the years they have been in the system?
ReplyDeleteSo they are adequate for the classroom according to the DOE. It is not only stupid and destructive what they, the DOE, is doing it just does not make any sense.
When Mayoral Control was agreed upon, the main ideology was to get experienced teachers into the neediest schools. It has nefariously backfired, we were betrayed, and it has been a hellish swindle since.
ReplyDeleteI what Pogue says is so true, I had forgotten that. What we have is a system run by a bunch of hypocrits
ReplyDeleteCheap EASY TO MANIPULATE newbies! I have been "kicked" off the Inquiry Team because I know too much. I can't wait for all the newbies to go into some of our seasoned teacher's classrooms and start taking notes. They are in for a rude awakening! Maybe they will learn something. It's really not their fault I guess.
ReplyDeleteI agree with so much in this post and all the comments.
ReplyDeleteBut I want to take this a bit further. Where you say in the first para. that the min. 3-5 years experience "seems to be ignored," it's time to recognize that the DoE does not ignore anything. Nor does it have a "failed ideology" (para. 3).
We have to look at the DoE's program for what it is — a socio-economic and political strategy to bust the unions and dismember public education piece by piece.
I am totally convinced at this point that they have no interest in children or in education. I see the DoE as one of many political and economic entities in this country focused on the redistribution of wealth (to a very few) and undoing the gains of the middle class in the past 40 years.
Maniacally attached as Klein & Co. is to large class size and holding a myopic vision of what constitutes "learning" and "skills," the proof of his success — not his failure — is tangible and visible. Kids aren't getting the preparation for adulthood they need, and the teaching profession as we knew it has been destroyed.
How much more successful can you be?
Woodlass:
ReplyDeleteI am not as cynical as you that they are deliberately trying to destroy public education. I believe that they are following a misguided outlook that changes the public school system without spending the money. The result is education on the cheap and a children last program.
You could very well be right, but from what I read about disaster capitalism, there are prototypes out there, and he seems to be following them in lock step. Keep the populace fettered and ignorant. Make your moves when they are weak.
ReplyDeleteI am just as cynical as Woodlass, probably more so. We are educating people to be good enough to do the dirty work of the Bloombergs and the Kleins of the world. I am sure t=neither of them would have allowed any of their children to be put through what public school children are doing daily. I really believe the only people they find worthwhile are the ones that come from their own backgrounds.
ReplyDeleteI'm part of the cynical team. I can't help but feel there is a deeper, far more insidious, rationale behind what the DOE has done. I see it first hand in my own school- our scores are declining, partially as a result of the "one size fits all" teaching methodologies imposed by the DOE, and partially because of the influx of brand new teachers.
ReplyDeleteAll mayoral control has done is destroy the NYC public school system.
Count me amongst the cynical also. I think that this system is designed to create what a friend who was in the corporate world for over two decades refers to as "cube slaves". I see evidence of this in destructive so-called reading programs such as that awful Columbia reading and writing program where real literature, analysis, and inference are sorely lacking. It's mass produced crap that does not promote actual literacy, just the ability to superficially interpret without any other thought. It's the non educators' version of education. As Pogue said, it's a "hellish swindle....."
ReplyDeleteI'm not saying that Kleinberg is unknowingly destroying the public school system. It doesn't take a rocket scientist that the classroom will suffer when you put newbie teachers in and use a "one-size-fits-all" teaching method. However, I find it difficult to believe they are intentionally trying to destroy the public schools.
ReplyDeleteMy real problem is how our union doesn't bring up the issues to the media and try to turn them to what is best for the students. Instead Randi just simply responds to these Kleinberg policy changes.
The result is the media simply follows the Tweed line that the reason the students don't learn is that the teachers' union is at fault.