

241 D.C. teachers fired over low student test scores - grellas
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704249004575385500484438266.html?mod=WSJ_hps_MIDDLESecondNews

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jseliger
This is a much bigger deal than it might appear at first glance. To understand
why, see my post that collects the many recent, detailed articles about how
difficult it is to fire teachers: <http://jseliger.com/2009/11/12/susan-engel-
doesnt-get> and why so much of K-12 education is so bad.

The short version: it's almost impossible to fire teachers in most districts,
even for egregious incompetence; unions reinforce those rules by protecting
bad teachers; some change is afoot because so many studies now demonstrate the
importance of teacher effectiveness on student learning, and that
effectiveness can't be predicted by factors like educational attainment or
test scores in college.

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chengas123
241 teachers were not fired over low test scores. 76 were fired for not having
proper credentials. 165 were fired for poor performance which takes into
account factors in addition to test scores such as classroom evaluations.

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nitrogen
I would hope that the 76 who didn't have proper credentials were at least
evaluated on performance before their dismissal. If any of those 76 were
actually excellent teachers, firing them on credentials alone without offering
the opportunity to earn their credentials while working is a tragic loss, and
smells of union-inspired member protection.

 _Disclaimer: both of my parents are teachers._

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mkramlich
I know nothing about the quality of these teachers, but I can say based on my
experience and insight that the quality of the students matters most, followed
closely by the quality of the parents and the home life and family culture
they provide. Teachers are a bit down the list. Because a student can always
learn outside school -- and really, will be or should, both before and after
the primary school years. There's only a narrow window in a person's lifetime
where there is forced public schooling, and that's the only period, at least
for most people, where the teacher quality is going to matter.

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whakojacko
Glad to see this go through. The Unions are going to fight it all the way, but
IMO it needs to happen. The current public school teaching system is pretty
broken, someone had to at least start to make a stand. Props to Rhee for being
willing to deal go through with it.

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reader5000
I love when PC goes too far. Teachers who have students with low iqs will have
low-testing students, by the very definition of iq and the fact that most
standardized tests are at least weakly correlated with iq tests. Vice versa.
Intelligence, especially as operationalized by standardized testing, is as
biological as height and athleticism. If I were a teacher in DC and the
majority of my students were not from middle+ class families, I would quit
ahead of time and save the district some trouble.

Honestly, what do people think "education" is? By lecturing at children cooped
up in classrooms for 6 hours a day and then shoving scantrons down their
throats everybody will magically become doctors and lawyers? All socioeconomic
class distinctions will be eliminated? There is no reason to make working
teachers suffer because of this unscientific bullshit.

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derefr
Could just take the first derivative. A teacher's job isn't to make kids
smart, it's to make them smart _er_.

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hugh3
Not smarter, just better-informed.

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derefr
I use "smart" to mean "rationally applying knowledge and avoiding bias." It
requires you to _have_ knowledge, as source material—so teachers are
responsible for that—but it also requires that you transform and synthesize
that knowledge in useful ways, which requires more than information, and _is_
something schools are supposed to teach ("learning how to learn.")

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schwit
Education is a team sport. The parents ought to be held equally if not MORE
accountable.

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anamax
> Education is a team sport. The parents ought to be held equally if not MORE
> accountable.

Ah yes, we shouldn't settle for anything less than perfection.

For any set of students+parents, some teachers will do better than others. Why
should kids with lousy parents have to settle for lousy teachers as well?

Part of being a good teacher is managing mediocre parents. Why should kids
with mediocre parents have to settle for lousy teachers?

