This past week, parents across Washington State began receiving letters notifying them that the schools their children attend are failing. The letters are a result of the Democrats in the State Legislature failing to stand up for students – and stand up to the teachers union that funds their campaigns.
That failure resulted in the state losing a federal waiver to the “No Child Left Behind Act” (NCLB) and being required to send these letters. And it was all because Democrats in the State House and Senate refused to amend state law to require that student test scores be considered in teacher evaluations – to change the law from saying test scores “may” be considered to “shall” be considered.
That’s right – the state teachers union is so afraid of public accountability that it couldn’t later negotiate away that it twisted the arms of Democrat legislators (some of whom had even sponsored the legislation) to vote against changing one word, even though how much test scores would be considered did not have to be defined. How students performed on tests might only be 1% of a teacher’s evaluation – but that was 1% too much for the union bosses telling the Democrats what to do in Olympia.
As SHIFT reported in the past, thanks to this mind-numbing cowardice of legislative Democrats, our state lost control of nearly $40 million in federal grants allocated to low-income children. In addition, certain school districts — those which failed to meet the NCLB’s mandate that all students must be passing state standards in reading and math by 2014 — must send letters of failure to parents.
Of course, many school districts apparently don’t want to stand up to the teachers union they have to negotiate with, so a press conference was held and sample letters released to the media. Some 28 school districts are planning to include letters of their own, calling the NCLB law “regressive and punitive,” assuring the parents that their school district is indeed not failing despite, well, failing to meet the federal standard.
One failure that the school districts’ letters do not mention? The failure of the WEA toward our school children. Unfortunately, the WEA does not appear to think of the federal waiver loss in terms of failure. At a March 3rd hearing, WEA representative Lucinda Young told lawmakers that they should not worry about the possible loss of control over nearly $40 million in federal funds because school districts have a “huge amount of money.”
So that’s the lesson the school district leaders are teaching students as they prepare to return to school – our failure is really the failure of federal law – and the union representing your own teachers thinks that $40 million is not really that much money.
There is a problem in teacher evaluations that is hard to resolve. A student’s success reflects the efforts of many different people. In the last school where I taught, only two classrooms had 100% of students who met the competency standards. Those two classes, a first grade and a second grade, were assisted by the same ELL teacher. (ELL means English Language Learners. Up to 50% of the K-2nd graders spoke English as their second language.) One other class she worked with did not meet standards.
The two classroom teachers were given great applause, which they richly deserved. Unfortunately, no one recognized that the ELL teacher also had an enormous influence on what those children learned. Three other ELL teachers in the school used totally different materials and methods, and their students did not, for the most part, meet competency standards.
There are many specialists in schools giving students a wide range of academic help. Unfortunately, when students fail, classroom teachers get the blame; when students succeed, classroom teachers get the credit.
Intelligent people recognize foolishness when they see it. If Republicans and Democrats use simplistic reasoning to try to solve complicated issues, intelligent people are going to turn away in disgust. If the Republican Party wants to earn the respect and support of thinking people, it needs to discard the lazy approach to solving problems.
Republicans must do better. Can’t we come up with a system that is fair to all teachers? Can’t we devise a system that will evaluate the skills of individual school district employees? It must be fair, it must take into account all the factors that influence a child’s learning. The Democrats want to give all the praise and blame to the classroom teacher. Republicans can do better.
We can’t logically continue to criticize if we are not willing to put our brains to work to find a solution. I hope our party is not guilty of gloating over the inadequacy of the educational system. Does lousy education give us such wonderful ammunition against the teachers’ unions and the Democrats that we are willing to sacrifice the futures of millions of American children to win an election? That kind of a self-serving, manipulative attitude would lower Republicans to the level of the NEA.