http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-lausd-schools26-2009aug26,0,4203620.story
This vote will set up a procedure for the LAUSD to "giveaway" campuses (allow charter schools to operate them) including 50 schools currently under construction.
Obviously as a public school teacher I am a proponent of public schools, but I think we do have to admit we're failing. This whole thing is basically coming down to a fight over unionization of teachers. From the article:
District officials and others have said their ability to achieve more than incremental progress is hindered by the powerful teachers union, whose contract makes it nearly impossible to fire ineffective tenured teachers. Union leaders blame a district bureaucracy that they say fails to include teachers in "top-down reforms."
There are things the union needs to make compromises on to allow reform to happen. If the schools can't get rid of, or at least keep from becoming permanent, crappy teachers in their 2-year probationary period, maybe it does need to be extended. But doesn't this beg the question, what is going on with the administrators at the schools that they can't do what is necessary to keep crappy teachers from becoming permanent after 2 years. We have this problem in my school. We have a math teacher who's been there for 5 years and is horrible. They certain knew this after 2 years but she wasn't kept from becoming permanent and now the process to get rid of her is much more difficult. Last year our principal made a deal with her that she wouldn't give her an unsatisfactory review if she would transfer. She of course hasn't found anywhere to go and will be back with A-track.
Also, I haven't been evaluated over my 2 years, and now I'm permanent. We have a principal and 5 APs, and they can't take care of this stuff? Sigh...
haha, I didn't know all of that about the public school system. I never understood why it is so hard for a system to fire teachers, especially bad ones. The school system needs to be looked at like a business and fire the teachers who are not performing (I think performance should be done by evaluation and not student test scores, what do you think?) This would allow optimal education in public schools, if it's broke fix it!
ReplyDeleteAgreed. Test scores can be one component, but certainly should not be the only as I hope we expect and want more from our students than the ability to take standardized tests.
ReplyDeleteI think it is important there is a process for getting rid of bad teachers, but really I think even more important for LAUSD is keeping the good teachers.
The good thing about standardized test is that if you get a bad boss, you can still prove your high perfomance with better test scores then your peers...
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