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January 23, 2008 05:45 PM UTC
30 Comments
Not sure how Merrifield fits into this story, besides your dislike for the man and his previous comments, but this union rejection benefits no one.
A proposal from the teachers, principal and the local union rep is rejected by the teacher’s union in a statement that buries any progress in union bureaucracy.
The teacher’s union should face a rebellion from its members. It would seem through their actions and through their words they are not interested in providing ways to school improvement, rather their interest lies in protecting the power they have to stifle change.
This poster understands that change must be thoughtful and planned, yet these requirements should not be used as cover for an organization more afraid of losing their power than helping kids.
Over the last year, in the candidates they endorsed and in the manner they protect their turf, the DCTA has rapidly lost credibility.
OK, rant over, thanks Laughing Boy, off to more important work…
I am not happy with the union on this. Kids should be the first priority.
Teachers need the union to protect them from political retailation, because there are huge politics within schools. Because teachers essentially do the same job their whole career (there is no heirarchy unless they become administrators) they need a compensation system that reflects there are no “promotions”, and the need protections from being replaced by younger cheaper workers, protections the union offers. But…
They have to remember that kids are the first priority. Charters are not always the answer, but dps has good history with them.
What specifically is so objectionable.
I’m not advocating destroying the union, they just have a long way to go in terms of doing the right thing for kids in DPS.
I’m offended by Merrifield’s smugness over a human cost he could ease, but doesn’t have to witness firsthand.
It’s now very obviously more about power than doing the right thing for kids.
Good job. Yet another example of how the unions hinder progress in our schools
And the union leadership will look areound and ask – “why?”
If no one else, they should trust the teachers in the school who are willing to try something different to improve the school. If they keep saying no and allow only incremental change, then support will build to get them out of the way like Reagan did with the air traffic controllers.
A constructive union adds to the system. A reactive union subtracts.
As a member of the party that helps unions block progress for our children, it is refreshing to see you at least are thinking about the problem.
Unions should be supportive of the individual members, and in this case it appears they’re acting out of fear instead of hope.
The union is already a bit skittish after the recent DPS contract reforms, I’m guessing. Having a school radically departing from union standards enforcement is likely to send up warning signals to union bosses used to dealing with backhanded school management.
In this case, though, the local union rep and the teachers want this to go forward. Local control should rule here, but instead it’s being stifled. Bad move – hope they re-consider.
You’d hate to do something that helped the f*&^&ing students, eh?
I’m sorry this makes me so mad, but I work with a lot of these kids, and they have such a slim chance of success in DPS. It’s really horrible.
Wanted to clarify…
Teachers and school administration crafted this plan. Parents were NOT involved and do NOT get to vote…the foundations are waving money…$100,000….is a lot of money….the whole thing stinks to high heaven…..
the assumption that these changes will help kids is not substantiated…because there is not an independent study showing what the problem was at Bruce Randolph to being with; what reforms were linked to student improvement and what impact the changes might have…
For example, it seems to me that one proposed change…and I could be wrong…was to take a social work position and redirect to someone whose focus was reducing truancy….noble goal…what happens to the kids who needed the social work services??
What happens if the waviers get granted and the principal leaves? the teachers go elsewhere? the Piton money goes for training and once trained, the teachers go to another school in another district? happens all the time in DPS..
Bruce Randolph was a middle school on the state failure list and had three years to improve….this new principal took over, changed the configeration from 6-8th to a school which goes from 6 to 12 and on the basis on this got more years to go from failing to low performing…which she did…..but this is still a brand new configeration…
Plus, of course, again with apologies to Boulder Dave and you other guys from out of district with the bright ideas……denver voters approved Pro-comp…twenty million dollars more PER YEAR …to give teachers incentative pay to improve achievement and work with poor and minority kids…we are still being taxed; that program is barely two years old…and Bruce Randolph wants get out from some of its provisions…..
I don’t like cliches, I don’t like sirota and polis, I don’t like coventional wisdom and I don’t like kids getting jerked around in the name of so-called “reform.”
..
Because you can’t be a teacher involved in this issue. Here’s what a union rep. teacher at BR had to say…
Greg Ahrnsbrak, a union representative at the school, called the counterproposal half-hearted and said the waivers offered essentially insert the union into decisions about hiring and teacher time.
“They are doing everything they can to block a real reform effort,” Ahrnsbrak said. “Reform is happening. You’re either going to be on the bus or beneath it. I want to be driving it.”
What makes you think you’d know better what these kids need than a teacher at that school who’s a dues-paying union member?
Dwyer, come hang out with me sometime and meet some gang members. I’m sure you’d be really interested to hear what some of these kids have to say about DPS.
We don’t know if the changes would help. What we do know is the present system is horrible. So my vote is every school that wants to try something very different and has buy in from most of those at the school – go for it.
It can’t be worse and if we have enough experiments some will find a much better approach.
Read my post, LB. What did I say? I said that the parents do NOT get to vote on the plan. If it is such a bright idea, why is the teaching staff afraid to let the parents vote?
Let the parents vote on this.
The second thing is I said is that there is NO objective audit of the school to identify what has worked and where the problems are…
boulder dave..you piss me off…smug as a bug in your demographically hermatically sealed BVSD….just go ahead and “do anything”…..asked the Manual kids…who were “the beneficiary of Gates Foundation back in 2001,2002, 2003, 2004, 2005….where are they now? Where the f are the 500 kids from manuel who were tossed to the four winds in the name of “reform”…ask them if the situation was so horrible that anything was better….
Spare me the crap…LB…don’t patronize me about hanging out with gang ….where do u think I learned the language????
So I get the bum’s rush here ..the santimonous dump…because I did what? Said the parents should vote and there ought to be an independent audit….
There you go…I am really one reactionary old goat…
And I think there must be an audit both before and ongoing to measure if there is progress. But it’s also key that when things are this broken we insist on trying large changes.
As to my “hermatically sealed BVSD” I spent 3 years as a member of the BVSD MEAC committee which was the main district wide committee addressing issues for kids of color (I was the only white male on MEAC). And while not as bad as DPS, it is still terrible for poor (which means primarily latino) kids here.
And I hated the lack of progress while watching what we could do as my daughters gained a great education in the same school district.
Even up here in Boulder we are failing many of our children. And that is horrible.
Why are the poor/minority kids failing in BVSD?
Socio-Economic Status trumps most everything else. Overcrowded classrooms, insufficient support structure, poor teachers, low expectations, lack of parental involvement, crappy buildings, etc.
The biggest problem is business as usual is accepted as the default moving forward instead of being viewed as a total failure and therefore is the one unacceptable approach.
And even for us well-off parents with kids in some of the top public schools in the state, it still has problems. One of my daughters had a 7th grade math teacher who was totally incompetent. So I taught my daughter math that year. Because incompetence in the subject matter is no grounds for removing a teacher.
Our advantage over DPS is not the school system, it’s the educational level and socio-economic status of the parents.
Are you voicing your own opinion or are you quoting from a study done in BVSD? See, economic level of parents and the educational attainment of the mother (!) are absolute predictors of educational attainment. I asked specifically if you knew why minority/poor kids in BVSD were not achiving. I should have prefaced it by saying beyond the above predictors…economic status and mother’s educational level. See, if poor/minority kids in Boulder are deliberately being placed in crappy buildings, w/o adequate support structure, bad teachers and overcrowded classrooms…then there is grounds for a civil rights suit…Colorado constitution guarantees an equal educational OPPORTUNITY. School districts don’t have the right to discriminate against kids by offering them substandard infrastructure on the basis of race or income level. You knew that right?
If you contend that it doesn’t matter, that income level is always going to win out…then why change anything????
See, make a factual argument and I’ll listen….but for an educatedl man, who not only understands but could teach his daughter 7th grade math…you can do better.
If there is a really bad teacher in a school with well-off kids, the pressure from involved parents generally drives the teacher to transfer. You don’t get that level of pressure in the poorer areas.
Same for additional programs funded by the PTO – in the best off areas the PTO sometimes is paying for an additional teacher for special programs such as additional Talented & Gifted.
The list goes on. It’s the pressure and $$$ the parents bring to bear that has a significant impact.
Finally, yes S.E.S. trumps all – but that means what the schools do is immaterial. My main point is that a well run school should be able to overcome S.E.S. and that is what I am looking for.
I have seen the same thing in Denver, Dave. What you are describing is the power of affluent parents, not because of high IQ or placing a value on education, but because they have political power to get rid of a bad teacher or bad infrastructure. and the money to privately provide what the public school can not…..
Now to say that a “well run school should be able to overcome S.E.S.” is hypothesis…..could be tested…except, of course, you would have to define “well run”….and you can’t set up a experiment involving kids…ie. a control school which is what “badly run?”….so two things can be done. One is to look at schools where all students, regardless of S.E.S. are achiving at grade level and see if those factors making the difference can be identified….or do an independent audit of schools not doing well and see if the reasons, particular to that school, can be identified…
The folks at Bruce Randolph haven’t done either….they just want autonomy. ….and $100,000 from the foundation.
The plan is not proved sound. The devil is in the details….
Let the parents vote on it.
How many kids did Manual graduate the year before they shut it down? Same with North?
It’s you who are as painfully out of touch as the Union leaders that are damaging any credibility they had remaining with this garbage.
You can post on a blog and insult everyone, but it doesn’t make you pope of this dump. Look how much agreement across the board from right to left there is that this is total BS.
You and I both know that the parents would probably vote unanimously for this autonomy. It’s a dodge.
OK, ready for your profane, inane reply.
Why in the world would you think parents of students at BR wouldn’t want their children to have what’s considered by seemingly everyone other than union brass to be a better opportunity for their kids?
Do they just ‘not know what’s best for themselves’?
It is inane to ask for an independent audit to determine what is working and what is not working? I don’t have a clue how the parents feel, nor do you. Just let them vote on any changes. Popes don’t like voting; democracy is dangerous as a priest once explained to me….
Manual is a tragedy….close the school and then nobody gradates…ya, that’s the thing. Close the school…out of sight..out of mind…ya, that is real bright…..developmentally, babies learn that is not true about nine months…
Countries who beat us in educational contests…all have one thing in common….they ability group…they sort kids out at about 11 or 12…only the very brightest get the kind of education we attempt to give to all kids…..that is why those countries consistently do better than we do….but you knew that..right? Because you are real smart….
I think you were just up for a cheap rant at teacher unions….and I just asked some legtimate questions…As I said, I don’t like cliches or conventional wisdom……
Educated people are not threatened by legtimate questions. Bear that in mind next time you parade out the insults…
recommend this Diary
Do you want to jinks this?
Kidding aside. Education is an issue I have a lot of passion for. I am not in this district, but I have served on a school board and several advisory positions.
I am for the “do what works attitude” you expressed. We can and must do better for the children in our schools.
If you look at the highest performing countries, those that consistently out perform American kids, they have one thing in common. The money follows the kid, not the address.
School choice can, has, and will improve education.
http://abcnews.go.com/2020/sto…
That’s something we should all be agreeing on.
School choice can improve education. At the same level of logic, it can, has, and will also be detrimental to education. I.e. sometimes it helps, sometimes not. School choice does not have a great record in this country when it’s weighted against student aptitude and socio-economic status, but there are examples of good alternative schools to be found and we should be learning from them.
Given the limited money we currently spend on education, anything with the word “voucher” in it is Right Out for me; other school choice options, we can talk…
“If you do what you have always done…You will get what you have always got.”
The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over, and expecting a different outcome.
Vouchers are a NO WAY for you. Well in truth they don’t cut it for me either. It must go way beyond vouchers before real change will take place.
We must empower the parents. They must be “in charge” of the decision on where their child goes to school. If you make the parents the customer of education, the customer will get what they want or demand. (Or nearly so.) Much closer than the current 18th century system+ 20th century Public employee union work rules.
The money must follow the child, not the address. Until you make that mind shift, nothing major will change.
I duplicate posted. sorry. these eyes are old.
And I wasn’t being a smartass about coming with me some day. It’s an open offer.
Realistically, it not something I can probably do…..but what about having your kids post here? The real voice missing from the debate is the voice of these kids…..
You might have to provide a translation is their vocab is all textmix….but, I bet we could figure it out…
Do another diary, LB…help the kids to have their say here….I promise I will read and learn…and not rant.