Professional Development

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Good News about Bad News

The New York Times published today the results of a Stanford survey on performance of students grades 3-8 on standardized tests. For once the investigators did not point to the characteristics of the schools, but the prosperity of the test-takers as clues to the disparity across races. The scatter-plots published showed Black students lagging behind White and Hispanic students, with White students dominating the region where two or three grade levels above expected performance were designated.

The investigators pointed out all the advantages that prosperous students have over impoverished students in school, factors that put urban schools at a disadvantage.
The real news, however, was the interview with the superintendent of Union City, NJ schools who beat the odds against them.

In one school district that appears to have beaten the odds, Union City, N.J., students consistently performed about a third of a grade level above the national average on math and reading tests even though the median family income is just $37,000 and only 18 percent of parents have a bachelor’s degree. About 95 percent of the students are Hispanic, and the vast majority of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunches.

Even a sound-bite of the reform strategies reveals the effective practices that may have raised their scores above the mean performances across class and race.

Silvia Abbato, the district’s superintendent, said she could not pinpoint any one action that had led to the better scores. She noted that the district uses federal funds to help pay for teachers to obtain graduate certifications as literacy specialists, and it sponsors biweekly parent nights with advice on homework help for children, nutrition and immigration status.

Professional development in literacy education makes common sense, but so many schools choose single events or technology quick-fixes for professional development. This shows investment in teachers with an eye to their retention.

The district regularly revamps the curriculum and uses quick online tests to gauge where students need more help or whether teachers need to modify their approaches.

Attention to formative assessment, not practice on standardized tests. This shows a laser focus on academic needs, not artificial attempts to goose the test scores. “Quick tests” shows that testing is used properly as a barometer of progress, not displacing the curriculum.

“It’s not something you can do overnight,” Ms. Abbato said. “We have been taking incremental steps everywhere.”

The superintendent refused to reduce the work to a magic bullet. You can see the comprehensive effort in engaging parents, addressing social needs, and recruitment of appropriate federal aid. The addressing of issues across the spectrum of the students’ lives shows a level of caring absent in many high-needs schools. The real lessons of the study are found in its outlier.

I have to admire a study that avoids simplistic conclusions and pays attention to the poverty of students. It finally reckons with the primary causes of failure in public education and even recognizing paths to success like the story of Union City. Perhaps the federal government and private foundations can align their support to programs like Union City’s, instead of the quasi-experimental and test-driven studies that emphasize the trivia of learning. The fundamental needs of students in poverty are driven by habits, personal literacy, and the collaboration of families with the goals of their schools.

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“Last Out-First In”

If you are a teacher educator, your heart sinks when teachers of one to three years’ experience lose their jobs due to lack of school funding.  Many of these teachers will receive their jobs back because of the signing of the “EduJobs” bill by President Obama on Monday. What impact will this have on the quality of teachers in the public schools?

“The status quo is exactly what this $10 billion will perpetuate,” scoffed Minnesota representative John Kline on Tuesday.

“Schools will continue to operate on ‘last hired, first fired’ policies that ignore student achievement when deciding which teachers to keep in the classroom.” He continued: “These dollars are not targeted based on jobs at risk or student needs. This is nothing more than an across-the-board inflation of state spending”[Education Week, August 12, 2010]

If the Congressman really knew the kinds of teachers who will be re-hired this fall because of this bill, his fiscal sensibilities would be comforted.  The newest teachers in the profession are the hope for change in schools at risk.

If we judge teachers as products of industry, their appreciation in value tends to increase sharply in the first three years of their careers.  One rationale for 3-4 years to make tenure is that the craft of teaching is perfected in the classroom. Teachers know this intuitively, but even the crude measures of the test scores of their students, show a sharp incline in the first three years of teaching and over the first five years of teachers who receive alternative credentials.  If we eliminate the jobs of teachers early in their careers, we are releasing them during a period when their value to the school is growing exponentially.

The cycle of releasing early career teachers and later hiring novice teachers when the budget permits it is a drain on the human resources of a school. As Linda Darling-Hammond has observed, “Schools that hire a parade of novices and short-term teachers must constantly pour money into recruitment and professional support for new teachers, without reaping benefits from the investments. Like filling a leaky bucket, these schools are forced to repeat this waste of energy and resources over and over again”(The Flat World and Education, 50).

Eliminating the job of the early career teacher would be like a major league baseball team grooming a star pitcher for three years and then releasing him without any compensation.  The next pitcher they bring up through their farm system would have the same learning curve, before they had to release him again. At least the major league club can make a trade and salvage their investment.

So the rehiring of teachers who were released this past spring is just sound fiscal management and not perpetuating any of the systemic evils Congressman Kline deplores.

But if we value teachers for their energy, their collaborative spirit, their eagerness to incorporate new methods and technologies, then these re-hires are —- priceless.  These teachers were hired during a very competitive market, they have the optimism often depleted by long careers, they were prepared with the most recent digital technologies, and they have been educated in the most recent standards for K-12 achievement.   They are a valuable resource for schools committed to reform.

Salvaging the jobs of early career teachers is one of most prudent investments the federal government can make in education.  No budget move can do more to grease the wheels of school reform. Now, eliminating the jobs of certain Congressional representatives, that’s another matter!