(02-02-2021 02:39 PM)TribeFan1983 Wrote:  

(02-02-2021 02:31 PM)WMInTheBurg Wrote:  

(02-02-2021 02:14 PM)TribeFan1983 Wrote:  

(02-02-2021 01:17 PM)WMInTheBurg Wrote:  

(02-02-2021 08:41 AM)TribeFan1983 Wrote:  Regulatory oversight over public school teachers is so lax that the PA School Code does not even define "incompetency." A court held the term means "an inability, incapacity, or lack of ability, legal qualification, or fitness to discharge the required duties." This vagueness is by design. You can't fire an incompetent teacher if you don't define the term.

This vagueness is by necessity. Do teachers getting the remedial class have the same measurables as those teaching an honors class? Does that mean that teachers have to be rotated in order to balance their class types? What if the teacher gets a class of students that does not put in the work no matter how many extra hours the teacher spends trying different strategies? What if the teacher doesn't do any work but has a class of students that put in extra work outside of class? Those are just a handful of the variables in play. Even just the measurables themselves are problematic. Measuring a teacher's performance against students' year over year grades doesn't take into account all the variables that can go into grades. Now throw in that it has to be codified so that teachers are evaluated fairly against each other, does that mean you have to go 3 year average, or 5 or 7? Again, the questions I have above are only a small portion of variables.

Private schools have different requirements for teachers, but they also have requirements for students.

The PSEA rejoices in whining that its too difficult to evaluate teachers. To them, it follows that all teachers deserve a raise, even the dolts and slackers. Must be infuriating for a hardworking teacher to watch her more senior colleague down the hall phone it in all year and make more money than he/ she does.

Right, difficult for all the reasons (and more) that I listed. Are you arguing that those reasons are invalid?

I'm arguing we should reward public school teachers based on student performance on standardized tests, post-secondary outcomes, classroom observation, student evaluations, etc. Get rid of the underperforming ones and reward the good ones. The NEA will never go for that.

The NEA will absolutely go for that, as long as there are meaningful ways to compare student outcomes that actually evaluate teacher performance instead of student ability. Throughout this thread, we've been beating that drum, that it's very difficult to separate out teacher performance from student ability. You complained earlier about teaching to the test, but what is a teacher supposed to do if that makes up a substantial portion of their performance evaluation? Is the goal to teach children or to get good test scores? If it's the latter, teachers have incentives to bounce kids out of their class if they think the kid is going to struggle. This is one of the primary criticisms of NCLB.

It sounds to me like you're arguing that the teachers union is not fighting for fair evaluation based on the advice of education professionals. This is similar to evaluating programmers on lines of code. It is a number, but that number is not representative of quality of the professional. The metrics put in place by NCLB do not accurately measure teacher performance. I gave you many, many reasons why in this thread already. This is what the teachers union is fighting against, not against being measured at all, just against being measured inaccurately, where the measurements incentivize performance that is counter to what you would want teachers to do.

(02-02-2021 02:54 PM)WMInTheBurg Wrote:  

(02-02-2021 02:39 PM)TribeFan1983 Wrote:  

(02-02-2021 02:31 PM)WMInTheBurg Wrote:  

(02-02-2021 02:14 PM)TribeFan1983 Wrote:  

(02-02-2021 01:17 PM)WMInTheBurg Wrote:  This vagueness is by necessity. Do teachers getting the remedial class have the same measurables as those teaching an honors class? Does that mean that teachers have to be rotated in order to balance their class types? What if the teacher gets a class of students that does not put in the work no matter how many extra hours the teacher spends trying different strategies? What if the teacher doesn't do any work but has a class of students that put in extra work outside of class? Those are just a handful of the variables in play. Even just the measurables themselves are problematic. Measuring a teacher's performance against students' year over year grades doesn't take into account all the variables that can go into grades. Now throw in that it has to be codified so that teachers are evaluated fairly against each other, does that mean you have to go 3 year average, or 5 or 7? Again, the questions I have above are only a small portion of variables.

Private schools have different requirements for teachers, but they also have requirements for students.

The PSEA rejoices in whining that its too difficult to evaluate teachers. To them, it follows that all teachers deserve a raise, even the dolts and slackers. Must be infuriating for a hardworking teacher to watch her more senior colleague down the hall phone it in all year and make more money than he/ she does.

Right, difficult for all the reasons (and more) that I listed. Are you arguing that those reasons are invalid?

I'm arguing we should reward public school teachers based on student performance on standardized tests, post-secondary outcomes, classroom observation, student evaluations, etc. Get rid of the underperforming ones and reward the good ones. The NEA will never go for that.

The NEA will absolutely go for that, as long as there are meaningful ways to compare student outcomes that actually evaluate teacher performance instead of student ability. Throughout this thread, we've been beating that drum, that it's very difficult to separate out teacher performance from student ability. You complained earlier about teaching to the test, but what is a teacher supposed to do if that makes up a substantial portion of their performance evaluation? Is the goal to teach children or to get good test scores? If it's the latter, teachers have incentives to bounce kids out of their class if they think the kid is going to struggle. This is one of the primary criticisms of NCLB.

It sounds to me like you're arguing that the teachers union is not fighting for fair evaluation based on the advice of education professionals. This is similar to evaluating programmers on lines of code. It is a number, but that number is not representative of quality of the professional. The metrics put in place by NCLB do not accurately measure teacher performance. I gave you many, many reasons why in this thread already. This is what the teachers union is fighting against, not against being measured at all, just against being measured inaccurately, where the measurements incentivize performance that is counter to what you would want teachers to do.

School psychologists call your approach "paralysis by analysis." Keep pretending to search for a perfect answer while nothing gets done. Cut the knot. Evaluate the teachers. Get rid of the bad ones. That would be a start.

(02-02-2021 03:12 PM)TribeFan1983 Wrote:  Cut the knot. Evaluate the teachers. Get rid of the bad ones. That would be a start.

I'm on board. How would you decide who's bad?

He is not interested in digging into the details of a working solution, because that’s harder than complaining about the perceived problem. We agree on a lot, though. From a teacher perspective, it IS infuriating to watch bad teachers get equal or better pay than you. The current evaluating system DOES allow gutless administrators to ignore bad performers if they choose to.

What would be interesting is actually acknowledging the reality of what would need to happen to replace the bad, fired teachers. Firing bad teachers is a good thing. But if there’s no quality pool to pull from to replace them, you didn’t fix the problem. I do think it all goes back to making it a desirable profession financially.

(02-02-2021 04:42 PM)HyperDuke Wrote:  He is not interested in digging into the details of a working solution, because that’s harder than complaining about the perceived problem. We agree on a lot, though. From a teacher perspective, it IS infuriating to watch bad teachers get equal or better pay than you. The current evaluating system DOES allow gutless administrators to ignore bad performers if they choose to.

Side note on this that I think a large assumption to the opposite is being made in 83's argument.

This can be said about a LOT of professions. I bet you almost everyone on this board, regardless of profession, has felt this about a job at some point in their career at least once.

(02-02-2021 04:42 PM)HyperDuke Wrote:  He is not interested in digging into the details of a working solution, because that’s harder than complaining about the perceived problem. We agree on a lot, though. From a teacher perspective, it IS infuriating to watch bad teachers get equal or better pay than you. The current evaluating system DOES allow gutless administrators to ignore bad performers if they choose to.

What would be interesting is actually acknowledging the reality of what would need to happen to replace the bad, fired teachers. Firing bad teachers is a good thing. But if there’s no quality pool to pull from to replace them, you didn’t fix the problem. I do think it all goes back to making it a desirable profession financially.

In PA, if a new teacher keeps his/ her nose clean, he/ she gets tenure automatically after 2-3 years. Then, the quality of his/ her teaching is irrelevant. As long as he/ she doesn't deal drugs or sleep with his/ her students, he/ she has a job for life. He/ she will make $85,000- $115,000/ year by his/ her mid-40's. Then he/ she can retire at age 55- 58, earning full salary for the rest of your life. I have plenty of friends who have done this. How is that not "financially desirable."

Ok.

(02-02-2021 04:42 PM)HyperDuke Wrote:  He is not interested in digging into the details of a working solution, because that’s harder than complaining about the perceived problem. We agree on a lot, though. From a teacher perspective, it IS infuriating to watch bad teachers get equal or better pay than you. The current evaluating system DOES allow gutless administrators to ignore bad performers if they choose to.

What would be interesting is actually acknowledging the reality of what would need to happen to replace the bad, fired teachers. Firing bad teachers is a good thing. But if there’s no quality pool to pull from to replace them, you didn’t fix the problem. I do think it all goes back to making it a desirable profession financially.

The lack of teacher accountability is not a "problem." It is a central feature of the public school system in PA. The drafters of the School Code purposely omitted any definition of "incompetency" to make it next to impossible to fire tenured teachers on that basis. Reformers would need to amend the School Code to add criteria for firing teachers. The PSEA will never, ever allow that to happen. So here we are.

Guess public education can’t be fixed then. It’s just impossible to implement real measures to repair it. I mean, if it’s like that in PA, it must be that way everywhere!

(02-02-2021 06:50 PM)TribeFan1983 Wrote:  

(02-02-2021 04:42 PM)HyperDuke Wrote:  He is not interested in digging into the details of a working solution, because that’s harder than complaining about the perceived problem. We agree on a lot, though. From a teacher perspective, it IS infuriating to watch bad teachers get equal or better pay than you. The current evaluating system DOES allow gutless administrators to ignore bad performers if they choose to.

What would be interesting is actually acknowledging the reality of what would need to happen to replace the bad, fired teachers. Firing bad teachers is a good thing. But if there’s no quality pool to pull from to replace them, you didn’t fix the problem. I do think it all goes back to making it a desirable profession financially.

The lack of teacher accountability is not a "problem." It is a central feature of the public school system in PA. The drafters of the School Code purposely omitted any definition of "incompetency" to make it next to impossible to fire tenured teachers on that basis. Reformers would need to amend the School Code to add criteria for firing teachers. The PSEA will never, ever allow that to happen. So here we are.

You can keep repeating it, but teachers unions aren't against that. You've set up a strawman that teachers unions are against all attempts at accountability.

https://www.penncapital-star.com/educati...-his-mind/

The evaluation system put in place in 2013 was determined by educators and the sponsor of the 2013 bill to value test scores over classroom evaluations. This article is from 2019, I'm not sure whether the new bill proposed in 2020 was adopted or not. Counter to your argument that there is no system in place for holding PA teachers accountable, or that the union has resisted any attempt to put such a system in place, this article talks about the system that was put in place in 2013 and the changes being proposed to more accurately evaluate teachers.

(02-02-2021 02:39 PM)TribeFan1983 Wrote:  I'm arguing we should reward public school teachers based on student performance on standardized tests, post-secondary outcomes, classroom observation, student evaluations, etc. Get rid of the underperforming ones and reward the good ones. The NEA will never go for that.

In my observation, this sounds very much like how it is done in Northern VA/Southern MD. Teachers are lauded for student performance on standardized tests. While trying to teach up kids to meet test scores is important, I'm not sure if it is a fair measure of a teacher's competence. A better measure is where a kid tests at the start of the year compared to where they are at the end. Even with that, there are so many factors outside the teachers control that effect a kids ability to succeed or fail. A "crappy" teacher at a higher socioeconomic school will have better test results than a "good" teacher at a low income area school. Kids with parents that are around generally do better than classmates that are being raised by grandma. It's just how it is.

Teachers are routinely monitored for performance by supervisors. If they are not reaching expectations, generally a plan is put together for them on things that are not being performed up to expectations. If these requirements are reasonable and not being met after advisement, there is a paper trail heading towards discipline and or firing. It happens often and the union doesn't block it where reasonable.

I think everyone agrees that you want to reward good teachers and get rid of the bad ones. My issue is how you can fairly determine who's who. The ways you mentioned for evaluation are certainly things to factor in, I'm just not sure if it is ever so simple. The blatantly bad ones are easily recognized and they are dealt with. It's very easy to have good teachers in an underperforming situation.

Here's another link showing that the teacher evaluation system is being examined to make sure that it's measuring teacher performance allowing for student economic status. The point is, teachers in Pennsylvania are not only being evaluated for performance, but there's ongoing attempts to make sure that the evaluations are measuring the performance/behavior that the teachers can control.

https://www.psea.org/issues-action/key-i...on-reform/

Given that there seems to be a large gap in coverage for 2020, my assumption is that this was temporarily tabled while schools focused on how to teach in a pandemic, but it looks like there are bills ready to go that have support in the legislature and education community.

(02-02-2021 08:50 PM)WMInTheBurg Wrote:  Here's another link showing that the teacher evaluation system is being examined to make sure that it's measuring teacher performance allowing for student economic status. The point is, teachers in Pennsylvania are not only being evaluated for performance, but there's ongoing attempts to make sure that the evaluations are measuring the performance/behavior that the teachers can control.

https://www.psea.org/issues-action/key-i...on-reform/

Given that there seems to be a large gap in coverage for 2020, my assumption is that this was temporarily tabled while schools focused on how to teach in a pandemic, but it looks like there are bills ready to go that have support in the legislature and education community.

I read the PSEA policy declaration quite differently.

1) "Reducing the impact of standardized tests and student performance components." This is just the latest in PSEA's decades-long battle against objective accountability for student achievement. Without measurement, there is no accountability.

2) "Increase the focus on classroom observation and practice." Good, but the School Code still makes it impossible to fire incompetent teachers, so what's the point?

3) "Recognize the impact of student poverty on student performance." This gives a free pass to teachers in poor districts. As a special ed attorney, I see Districts use the "blame the victim" approach all the time. At IEP meetings, if the disabled child is struggling, the first question administrators ask is "how are things at home?" [They'd be a lot better if you were offering my child an appropriate education] "Do you need us to call Children and Youth?" [Always delivered with a menacing smile]

4) "Encourage greater collaboration." Of course, but that does nothing to hold teachers accountable.

The PSEA will never, ever support legislation to make it easier to remove underperforming members. Unions never do.

(02-03-2021 08:02 AM)TribeFan1983 Wrote:  

(02-02-2021 08:50 PM)WMInTheBurg Wrote:  Here's another link showing that the teacher evaluation system is being examined to make sure that it's measuring teacher performance allowing for student economic status. The point is, teachers in Pennsylvania are not only being evaluated for performance, but there's ongoing attempts to make sure that the evaluations are measuring the performance/behavior that the teachers can control.

https://www.psea.org/issues-action/key-i...on-reform/

Given that there seems to be a large gap in coverage for 2020, my assumption is that this was temporarily tabled while schools focused on how to teach in a pandemic, but it looks like there are bills ready to go that have support in the legislature and education community.

I read the PSEA policy declaration quite differently.

1) "Reducing the impact of standardized tests and student performance components." This is just the latest in PSEA's decades-long battle against objective accountability for student achievement. Without measurement, there is no accountability.

2) "Increase the focus on classroom observation and practice." Good, but the School Code still makes it impossible to fire incompetent teachers, so what's the point?

3) "Recognize the impact of student poverty on student performance." This gives a free pass to teachers in poor districts. As a special ed attorney, I see Districts use the "blame the victim" approach all the time. At IEP meetings, if the disabled child is struggling, the first question administrators ask is "how are things at home?" [They'd be a lot better if you were offering my child an appropriate education] "Do you need us to call Children and Youth?" [Always delivered with a menacing smile]

4) "Encourage greater collaboration." Of course, but that does nothing to hold teachers accountable.

The PSEA will never, ever support legislation to make it easier to remove underperforming members. Unions never do.

The bolded part is better written as "The PSEA will never, ever support legislation to make it easier to incorrectly assess members. Unions never do."

In section 3, what you're proposing is incentive to avoid teaching at schools in lower income areas. There's boatloads of research on this, try "impact of poverty on education" or something like that. For example, Teacher A, a great teacher, has a class full of kids that show up half the time due to other things in their life. They get lots of incompletes and zeros as a result. This teacher gets fired because of "objective test scores". Teacher B, a terrible teacher, has a class full of honors students that study on their own and have the highest grades in the school. This teacher cruises along. Statement 3 on the PHSA page is addressing that, no matter how you want to read it.

I'm out. I can only directly refute your statements so many times. Every one of your posts is full of your flawed opinions, with nothing to back them up. You're unwilling to consider that the words you're reading are true. I'm sorry for whatever got you to this place where you hate teachers so much.

(02-03-2021 10:03 AM)WMInTheBurg Wrote:  

(02-03-2021 08:02 AM)TribeFan1983 Wrote:  

(02-02-2021 08:50 PM)WMInTheBurg Wrote:  Here's another link showing that the teacher evaluation system is being examined to make sure that it's measuring teacher performance allowing for student economic status. The point is, teachers in Pennsylvania are not only being evaluated for performance, but there's ongoing attempts to make sure that the evaluations are measuring the performance/behavior that the teachers can control.

https://www.psea.org/issues-action/key-i...on-reform/

Given that there seems to be a large gap in coverage for 2020, my assumption is that this was temporarily tabled while schools focused on how to teach in a pandemic, but it looks like there are bills ready to go that have support in the legislature and education community.

I read the PSEA policy declaration quite differently.

1) "Reducing the impact of standardized tests and student performance components." This is just the latest in PSEA's decades-long battle against objective accountability for student achievement. Without measurement, there is no accountability.

2) "Increase the focus on classroom observation and practice." Good, but the School Code still makes it impossible to fire incompetent teachers, so what's the point?

3) "Recognize the impact of student poverty on student performance." This gives a free pass to teachers in poor districts. As a special ed attorney, I see Districts use the "blame the victim" approach all the time. At IEP meetings, if the disabled child is struggling, the first question administrators ask is "how are things at home?" [They'd be a lot better if you were offering my child an appropriate education] "Do you need us to call Children and Youth?" [Always delivered with a menacing smile]

4) "Encourage greater collaboration." Of course, but that does nothing to hold teachers accountable.

The PSEA will never, ever support legislation to make it easier to remove underperforming members. Unions never do.

The bolded part is better written as "The PSEA will never, ever support legislation to make it easier to incorrectly assess members. Unions never do."

In section 3, what you're proposing is incentive to avoid teaching at schools in lower income areas. There's boatloads of research on this, try "impact of poverty on education" or something like that. For example, Teacher A, a great teacher, has a class full of kids that show up half the time due to other things in their life. They get lots of incompletes and zeros as a result. This teacher gets fired because of "objective test scores". Teacher B, a terrible teacher, has a class full of honors students that study on their own and have the highest grades in the school. This teacher cruises along. Statement 3 on the PHSA page is addressing that, no matter how you want to read it.

I'm out. I can only directly refute your statements so many times. Every one of your posts is full of your flawed opinions, with nothing to back them up. You're unwilling to consider that the words you're reading are true. I'm sorry for whatever got you to this place where you hate teachers so much.

I don't hate teachers. I just believe, naively, that public school education, particularly special ed, should be about the students and not the teachers/ administrators.

(02-02-2021 02:05 PM)TribeFan1983 Wrote:  

(02-02-2021 01:54 PM)WMInTheBurg Wrote:  

(02-02-2021 01:49 PM)TribeFan1983 Wrote:  

(02-02-2021 01:25 PM)wml33t Wrote:  For perspective. This is data from Salary.com. This is the medium salary range for a number of positions in Philadelphia, PA:

Grocery Store Manager - 86,613
Police Officer - 61,900
Executive Assistant - 74,491
K-5 Teacher - 63,802
Lawyer II - 141,160
Licensed Plumber - 62,200
Help Desk Technician - 48,806
Software Engineer I - 75,000
Software Engineer III - 119,676
Restaurant Manager - 59,184
Financial Accounting Manager - 115,300

Salary.com data collection isn't perfect, but it's all collected in a similar way.

How many of the jobs you listed feature great benefits, summers off and iron-clad, guaranteed employment until retirement?

With regard to "summers off"... add up the hours teachers work over 9 months. Summer is comp time.

Ha. One of the most cherished myths in America is the selfless, underpaid, heroic public school teacher. If you just admit that fable is untrue, then we're in agreement.

I've held my tongue on this but I just want to say, as a former teacher myself, I feel sorry for your kids' teachers. A few points I'll weigh in on:

--You mention NCLB a handful of times in this thread. NCLB is no longer in effect. It was replaced by ESSA, the 2015 reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965 that is our foundation for federal education legislation. ESSA did not totally reverse every policy structure upheld by NCLB, but it's widely acknowledged that it is a significant improvement on several fronts, namely accountability requirements.
--Speaking of accountability, you don't seem to understand that this term carries a privileged meaning in ed policy. Under ESSA, state and local level entities are given significantly more leeway to design and enforce their own accountability measures-- a removal from NCLB's accountability requirements that wielded strong federal control. In my former district, for example, accountability was largely measured by student test scores on end-of-course exams, learning gains (how a student progresses in terms of test scores from one grade level to the next), district observations, administrator observations, and a range of other non-academic factors. These measurements are determined by state government and enacted by our district. Your point that teachers have no accountability is at best limited to your experience in PA, and at worst a silly misguided idea.
--The starting salary for a teacher in my state was $41k when I started and is now $45k. The median household income in the state is $56k (but about $101k in my city). Others on this thread have already spoken to how absurd your assertions on teacher pay are.
--Lastly, and not to get too personal since you are another member of the Tribe whom I respect by default, but some of your statements absolutely disgust me. I can only assume that you've had terrible experiences with teachers. But don't you think that the low perceptions of teachers you've espoused here contribute to the very problems you're trying to outline? This is generally a very hardworking, highly educated, underpaid and undervalued population that you've spent tons of time the last couple days just absolutely bashing. Who wants to become a teacher in a world where people like you express such contempt for them?

(02-03-2021 10:06 AM)TribeFan1983 Wrote:  I don't hate teachers. I just believe, naively, that public school education, particularly special ed, should be about the students and not the teachers/ administrators.

Special ed is its own nightmare, full of people making decisions that are not qualified to be making those decisions. In my (admittedly not personal) experience, you have about a 10-15% chance in any given school of having one person that's qualified. My impression is that more often than not, the teachers/administrators were put in that position because there was nobody else to do it, not because they were trained for it or were qualified. IMO, HyperDuke's opinion of throwing more money at that position stands the best chance of getting more people to go into the field, but it's a long-term fix. There isn't really a short-term fix; there aren't enough people that are trained to do it and pretty much every school has need of qualified personnel.

(02-03-2021 12:54 PM)WMInTheBurg Wrote:  

(02-03-2021 10:06 AM)TribeFan1983 Wrote:  I don't hate teachers. I just believe, naively, that public school education, particularly special ed, should be about the students and not the teachers/ administrators.

Special ed is its own nightmare, full of people making decisions that are not qualified to be making those decisions. In my (admittedly not personal) experience, you have about a 10-15% chance in any given school of having one person that's qualified. My impression is that more often than not, the teachers/administrators were put in that position because there was nobody else to do it, not because they were trained for it or were qualified. IMO, HyperDuke's opinion of throwing more money at that position stands the best chance of getting more people to go into the field, but it's a long-term fix. There isn't really a short-term fix; there aren't enough people that are trained to do it and pretty much every school has need of qualified personnel.

I have a PA-wide practice representing parents of special ed students. The parents I work with are, generally, furious with the public school system. That's particularly true during the pandemic, where SDs, for the most part, ignored special ed kids. Most of my practice involves private school tuition reimbursement claims.

(02-03-2021 12:46 PM)Swemster Wrote:  

(02-02-2021 02:05 PM)TribeFan1983 Wrote:  

(02-02-2021 01:54 PM)WMInTheBurg Wrote:  

(02-02-2021 01:49 PM)TribeFan1983 Wrote:  

(02-02-2021 01:25 PM)wml33t Wrote:  For perspective. This is data from Salary.com. This is the medium salary range for a number of positions in Philadelphia, PA:

Grocery Store Manager - 86,613
Police Officer - 61,900
Executive Assistant - 74,491
K-5 Teacher - 63,802
Lawyer II - 141,160
Licensed Plumber - 62,200
Help Desk Technician - 48,806
Software Engineer I - 75,000
Software Engineer III - 119,676
Restaurant Manager - 59,184
Financial Accounting Manager - 115,300

Salary.com data collection isn't perfect, but it's all collected in a similar way.

How many of the jobs you listed feature great benefits, summers off and iron-clad, guaranteed employment until retirement?

With regard to "summers off"... add up the hours teachers work over 9 months. Summer is comp time.

Ha. One of the most cherished myths in America is the selfless, underpaid, heroic public school teacher. If you just admit that fable is untrue, then we're in agreement.

I've held my tongue on this but I just want to say, as a former teacher myself, I feel sorry for your kids' teachers. A few points I'll weigh in on:

--You mention NCLB a handful of times in this thread. NCLB is no longer in effect. It was replaced by ESSA, the 2015 reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965 that is our foundation for federal education legislation. ESSA did not totally reverse every policy structure upheld by NCLB, but it's widely acknowledged that it is a significant improvement on several fronts, namely accountability requirements.
--Speaking of accountability, you don't seem to understand that this term carries a privileged meaning in ed policy. Under ESSA, state and local level entities are given significantly more leeway to design and enforce their own accountability measures-- a removal from NCLB's accountability requirements that wielded strong federal control. In my former district, for example, accountability was largely measured by student test scores on end-of-course exams, learning gains (how a student progresses in terms of test scores from one grade level to the next), district observations, administrator observations, and a range of other non-academic factors. These measurements are determined by state government and enacted by our district. Your point that teachers have no accountability is at best limited to your experience in PA, and at worst a silly misguided idea.
--The starting salary for a teacher in my state was $41k when I started and is now $45k. The median household income in the state is $56k (but about $101k in my city). Others on this thread have already spoken to how absurd your assertions on teacher pay are.
--Lastly, and not to get too personal since you are another member of the Tribe whom I respect by default, but some of your statements absolutely disgust me. I can only assume that you've had terrible experiences with teachers. But don't you think that the low perceptions of teachers you've espoused here contribute to the very problems you're trying to outline? This is generally a very hardworking, highly educated, underpaid and undervalued population that you've spent tons of time the last couple days just absolutely bashing. Who wants to become a teacher in a world where people like you express such contempt for them?

I just attended an IEP meeting with a "hybrid" district. Teachers instruct students in person twice per week and online twice per week. On Wednesdays, the teachers don't teach at all. Instead, they get to stay home. The kids can call or email them during "office hours" from 8 to 2. Meanwhile, the students watch random videos all day. It's hard to take your comments about "hardworking, underpaid and undervalued" teachers seriously when you confront stuff like that.

(02-03-2021 03:59 PM)TribeFan1983 Wrote:  I just attended an IEP meeting with a "hybrid" district. Teachers instruct students in person twice per week and online twice per week. On Wednesdays, the teachers don't teach at all. Instead, they get to stay home. The kids can call or email them during "office hours" from 8 to 2. Meanwhile, the students watch random videos all day. It's hard to take your comments about "hardworking, underpaid and undervalued" teachers seriously when you confront stuff like that.

This is the same as assuming that all of the time you're not with your clients you're doing nothing. It's bizarre that you're doubling down on "if I can't see them working they must be freeloading". When we abruptly went back to virtual learning here, teachers drove to students houses to drop off materials for the coming lessons. I have gotten messages at all hours of the day with comments or questions or attempts to schedule individual meeting time that my kid's teacher thinks he needs. Why would your default position be that teachers are doing nothing instead of trying to figure out how to teach in a completely different environment? In your case, you are probably dealing with special ed teachers who may or may not be qualified to be special ed teachers, who are now trying to figure out how to adapt to teach kids remotely that they might not know how to teach in person. There's just so much anger that seems like wasted energy.