I gotta tell you, liveblogging a speech isn't easy. The speaker has no regard for the fact that I am on a traditional keyboard and not a steno machine.
I do want to emphasize a direct quote from the governor's speech:
"Just last night, the Assembly passed major educational refom, reform that once seemed impossible, but now will become law as soon as it hits my desk. for too many years, too many children were trapped in low-performing schools; the exit doors may as well have been chained.
Now, for the first time, parents - without the principal's permission - have the right to free their children from these destructive schools.
That is a great freedom. Also in the past, parents had no power to bring about change in their children's schools. But that will now change.
Parents will now have the means to get rid of incompetent principals and take other necessary steps to improve their childrens' education. To increase accountability, we broke down the firewall so that teacher performance can be linked to student performance."
As an educator, I want to hear the devil in these details. I teach in a challenging school with apathetic students and often adversarial or just-as-apathetic parents. Please tell me how you are going to link my performance with results over which I have no control, especially when the student performance is often based on standardized state testing that the student doesn't even have to take or try hard on completing. I have watched many students just put down all "C's" on their multiple choice state test. Am I responsible for their performance? I will post more thoughts soon.
Good Day to You, Sir
"If a nation expects to be ignorant and free... it expects what never was, and never will be." --Thomas Jefferson
4 comments:
Can we not be held *at all* responsible for *any* learning?
I'll agree that we're not totally responsible, but we are *teach*ers. We must be somewhat responsible. Given that, how can we be judged reasonably and fairly?
As a substitute teacher, I spend my days listening to teachers beg parents to help their child learn basic math facts and read with their child for at least twenty minutes each day. The school provides the basic framework for education, but parents must ensure students practice outside of school hours. Accountability is not just for teachers. Parents MUST be held accountable as well.
MO
Sure teachers must be held responsible. I just worry about a plan and speech that makes absolutely no mention of student and parent responsibilities - just grievance procedures for what teachers and administrators supposedly don't do.
Look at NCLB....all responsibility is on the schools and teachers; NADA on parents and students. Governor Arnolds babblings were nothing new.
I'd like to know which "higher performing," "non-failing" schools have the room for the upcoming hoards of children from the failing, shitty schools?
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