tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5113479300897983388.post8564209666424734060..comments2024-01-06T06:09:29.140-05:00Comments on An Urban Teacher's Education: More Teachers Prepare to Leave Columbia Heightsjames boutinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09625944306253098621noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5113479300897983388.post-72369451153855680002010-04-24T18:08:31.100-04:002010-04-24T18:08:31.100-04:00Thanks for the support, Title1soccermom.
I don...Thanks for the support, Title1soccermom.<br /><br />I don't mean to give the impression that CHEC is a horrible school for students, which I'm sure you've noticed. Because they try to enact virtually every reform-minded strategy in contemporary education, they necessarily do a few things right. In my experience, I can say that they really forced me to increase the rigor of the content I was delivering, helped me understand how to better form my planning around DC's relatively poor standards, and helped me improve my classroom management (although my classroom management improvement was actually probably just me maturing as a teacher - when I think about it, I'm not sure CHEC had much to do with it).<br /><br />Where they fall short is in trying to do EVERYTHING. As one of my colleagues put it, they just throw everything at the wall and don't even wait to see if it sticks. As a result, teachers there are literally responsible for working what would be 30-hour work days if they faithfully complied with everything the CHEC administration demanded. The result is that teachers become disillusioned and quit, they just stop trying and become mediocre, OR the really good ones learn to ignore the administration and do good teaching despite them.<br /><br />The other way they fall short is, as I mentioned before, they've got people in administrative positions who don't have the experience or competence to do what's being asked of them, which I don't mean as a slight to them. Tukeva is expecting people who did two years of TFA and then jumped through some grad program (Harvard for some and New Leaders for New School for others) to be experts in their content area, experts at management, experts at professional development, AND experts at best pedagogical practice. You could teach for 30 years, get your PhD, and be a principal for a few years and still fall short of that requirement. As a result, these relatively young administrators "fake it" and make unrealistic demands on the teachers in order to make up for what they are understandably unable to do.<br /><br />Lastly, there's just something about the type of people she has as administrators. With the exception of one or two of them, they simply don't trust teachers, don't know how to talk to them, and can't even smile or say hello to them in the hallway. They are awful at building trust and seem to believe the best management strategy is intimidation. Obviously, there's not a lot of trust or communication happening as a result.<br /><br />So - overall, it's not such a bad school for the kids (with the exception of the fact that there's an administrator there who's been accused of physical and verbal abuse of students and staff and sexual harassment of staff), but it's definitely not the type of place I want to work.<br /><br />I'm somewhat doubtful that that story will change the minds of an organization like Fight for Children. But I guess you never know.james boutinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09625944306253098621noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5113479300897983388.post-68259874384517940992010-04-23T07:26:27.035-04:002010-04-23T07:26:27.035-04:00Very, very interesting. I do think you ought to em...Very, very interesting. I do think you ought to email Fight for Children and let them hear what you have to say or at least direct them to your blog.<br /><br />I think Fight for Children truly wants to do the right thing and much of the QSI is very good work. I think they may have been dazzled by Maria Tukeva though. I could be dead wrong though. FFC seems to be very enamored of TFA and New Leaders, so maybe they wouldn't be interested in hearing an alternative narrative to the CHEC success story.<br /><br />Either way, thanks for your analysis. I genuinely appreciate what you have to say and I'm sad that a teacher like yourself had to get out of DCPS. As a public school parent, I'm ashamed of the way you and your colleagues are treated at CHEC.<br />Title1soccermomAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5113479300897983388.post-23094306480226140802010-04-22T22:39:56.068-04:002010-04-22T22:39:56.068-04:00Title1soccermom: Thanks so much for sharing this. ...Title1soccermom: Thanks so much for sharing this. This is VERY interesting. I've had many conversations with teachers at CHEC about where Tukeva gets her money from. Many of them theorized that researchers must pay her to try their strategies because teachers at that school are asked to try something different practically every week, thereby making each new fad merely a hoop to jump through for staff who see their day-to-day duties as more important than trying to newest strategy when they know the administration won't care about it next week. So it's now clear that MCIP does bring in revenue for these things, and that's probably a reason things get so crazy at CHEC.<br /><br />Additionally, the bit in the report about Tukeva's shared leadership: it claims that she shares leadership with teachers and instructional experts (i.e. assistant principals who have both teaching experience and who are experts at professional development). I haven't talked to anybody at that school who believes that the leadership style is anything but top down. There are no real teacher leaders, except maybe one, and she quit after being persistently harassed by the admin. Also, Tukeva's APs who are supposedly experienced teachers and professional development experts probably all have about two years teaching experience with TFA, and I highly question their professional development experience. These are not professional teachers. They're people who want to move up the educational ladder quickly. And their attitude toward the teachers is horrendous. I was told by someone who sat in on their meetings (the cult as they're known among many of the staff) that they spoke about their teachers in horrific ways, and they were often heard boasting about which administrator gave the lowest IMPACT ratings. Many of them also did New Leaders for New Schools (referenced in the report), which is a TFA-like alternative administrative licensing program in the District promoted by those who believe that it's more important to get the right people than it is to train them to do the job well. So they all lead professional development, and they all give feedback to teachers, but because these are neither people who spent a ton of time in the classroom nor empathize with the realities of everyday urban education, they're not well-received by a largely young and relatively inexperienced staff (the consensus being that Tukeva prefers these types of teachers as they're easier to manipulate - supporters of the school would say that it takes a special type of workaholic to really provide a decent education to CHEC's unique population).<br /><br />So again - thanks for the report. This is like the missing link for me. I'd been wondering what it was that motivated the school to jump through so many unusual hoops, and now I know what their incentive was.james boutinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09625944306253098621noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5113479300897983388.post-31736068113962984242010-04-22T18:28:50.376-04:002010-04-22T18:28:50.376-04:00First, as a DCPS parent I am grateful for your blo...First, as a DCPS parent I am grateful for your blog. I appreciate your efforts as a teacher and a writer.<br /><br />Second, I would be interested in hearing your opinion of this report, produced by Fight for Children:<br /><br />http://fightforchildren.org/pdf/FFC_2009_qsi_case_studies.pdf<br /><br />I would really like to hear your analysis and I agree, there are certain narratives that prevail right now in the media. As a parent, I can say that what I read in the papers bears little resemblance to the reality my children face at school.<br /><br />Keep up the great work.<br />Title1soccermomAnonymousnoreply@blogger.com