You know, I am the first to admit that there are some lazy-ass teachers in this world. And there are some burn-outs and there are some who carry prejudice into their classrooms and have lower expectations for some students than others, but you know, most of us are true professionals working under incredibly difficult circumstances. And from an administration that says that it doesn't believe in regulation, they have no problem regulating public school teachers. We are highly educated people who spend time day in and day out with our students, but we are not allowed to make judgment calls and teach what we think a group of students most needs if it doesn't directly correlate to a standardized test. Tests which test what some faceless person somewhere who has never met our kids decides is the most important thing for them to know in that particular year of their life.
It doesn't matter if the kid has been in our school system for ten years or ten days. It doesn't matter if the kid has spoken English since birth or for one year. It doesn't matter if the kid has been in six schools that year or whether they have been absent more than present. It matters that that kid is sitting in that school on the day of the test. Take away the fact that schools with homogeneous populations, which can implement more one-size fits all solutions are rated the same as schools with diverse populations. Schools with highly mobile populations are rated the same as schools with stable populations. God help the schools with diverse and mobile populations.
And while we, the teachers, are supposed to meet every kid's diverse needs and meet them with individualized lessons, we the teachers--good, bad, dedicated or lump-butts are all rated under the same system and all treated to the same mind-numbing, poorly constructed, under-funded, generic "professional development". The message is that we are not "professional" enough to figure out what we need. Basically, the school districts don't have the funding to give us money to go get what we need. Here in Texas, if we want a masters degree, we pay for it out of our own pockets and in most districts get almost no, if any, pay bump for that degree.
Just like the kids are evaluated, teachers are, too. Shit runs downhill in public schools and shit hits those at the bottom--which would be the classroom. Teachers and students. The evaluations are ridiculous. Besides the obvious problems with the actual tests, in order for the district to cover its butt, they put kids and teachers through a series of "benchmark tests". The rationale we have to listen to is that we can use the statistics to find what areas we really need to highlight in our classes (I guess we can't figure that out on our own), but basically in order for the district to get its stats in order, we need to benchmark every kid--no matter if we already know hands down that that kid is going to pass the test with flying colors. Rather than teach a lesson that will meet a high achieving student at their level and move them forward, we need to spend several days each year not only giving these kids the "real" test, but also testing the test and benchmarking. Is it all the district's fault?--No. They are trying to come up with something to satisfy the State that brought the Nation-- Leave No Child Behind.
Plus, while the public schools are constantly strapped for cash to run any number of meaningful programs--consider how much it must cost to run the TAKS tests (Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills). Here is what is involved.
- The tests themselves need to be developed by private firms.
- The tests need to be printed.
- The tests need to be graded.
- "Monitors" are dispatched to schools to pop in and double check security of the tests as they are given--making sure that the teachers walk around the room, for example.
- The district pays people to audit the "security measures", including seat charts of where individual students sat during the test and logs of when the each of the two certified teachers who proctor each testing room have left to go to the bathroom.
- Reports are generated and uploaded to computer software showing which kids missed which questions.
- Generic study guides are printed and bound for general use by every and any student. (Most don't use them.)
- Specified study guides are generated, printed and bound for those juniors who did not pass the Exit-Level test the first time around. (Very few use them.)
- Tests are given endlessly until passed--by hook or by crook.
In the meantime, we don't have enough Spanish workbooks.
And the teacher evaluation systems are as inadequate and useless as the student evaluation systems. In our school's model for example, we can be marked down for not have a "specific, measurable objective" posted on our board at the start of class. It should demonstrate "higher learning objectives as demonstrated by Bloom's Taxonomy". Okay, I have one board in my classroom, where I teach three different classes--ESOL I, ESOL II and Spanish I and I, as a professional, feel I should be able to decide how to use my board space--like for teaching. I also teach ballet folklorico in the cafeteria--where there is no board. Now, I have never been called on this--and I try to write my objectives on the board and then erase them and put up new ones (not in folklorico), but whenever we try to get an answer as to why we need to do this, the answers are pretty insulting. Basically it is implied that if we don't write out an objective (and for some reason post it on the board) it indicates that we don't know what we are trying to teach, that we don't have any objectives for our kids, that our kids won't know what we expect of them and that we don't have a plan and that we don't have high expectations for our students.
My folklorico kids--who never see a written objective, perform more than twenty shows a year--both private and public. We just danced a quinceanera yesterday and the week before my competition kids danced a show with the University of Texas dancers without me even having to be there. These kids are pretty professional themselves. My officers read spread sheets and make purchasing decisions. They master not only dance and, choreography skills, but also leadership skills and financial skills that I would put up against those of any number of school administrators--or those of the current occupant of the White House for that matter. Some of these kids come from families where their parents didn't even go to high school. So much for writing objectives on the board or TAKS testing--folklorico--not a TAKS subject.
But the only way I get my folklorico kids to the heights I do is by putting in countless unpaid hours all year around. I put off having my own kids, too, because if I had a baby how could I work the way I do? And what keeps me from helping more kids? Underfunded health care, child care, and the lack of a living wage in this country. I know kids who would like to be in the folklorico program, but they can't rehearse after school, because they are the child care in their house hold for the younger brothers and sisters while their parents work extra jobs to put food on the table and pay for medications. Leave No Child Behind--Not on the cheap we don't. But it is cheaper to blame the teachers.
Parents who are working extra jobs and worrying about where the next meal is coming from or what will happen if they or their children become sick or injured are not likely to be checking homework and taking an active role in their child's school.
It falls on the teachers again and again and then our hands are tied behind our backs. We cannot be the social safety net for the entire Nation, so stop making us the scapegoat. We are not the problem. And neither are our poorest students. If this country wants an educated work force and wants to compete with the rest of the World, we need to get serious. We need to look at what other nations with educated workforces do.
Most of their teachers do NOT teach as many classes per day as our teachers do. Most other countries with educated work forces have universal health care. Most have more child care programs available to their citizens. They take some of these problems off their peoples' plates so they can actually focus on their educations.
Many teachers who come here from other industrialized countries are shocked at what is expected of teachers in this nation and what our workloads are like. Our school actually has a visiting teacher from China, who is amazed at what we have to do--from China. No wonder they are catching up.
Leave No Child Behind? Not on the cheap.
