Testing...One...Two...Three...Testing...Testing...

Is anybody out there?

"Virginia youngsters encounter SOL exams for the first time in third grade, and it's a pile-on. No other elementary grade undergoes four exams, and no other students are tested on cumulative knowledge as third-graders are. They must recall history and science facts gathered from kindergarten on. Every other grade is tested solely on the knowledge gained that particular year."

Roanoke Times 2/5/12

Testing third graders like we do goes against EVERYTHING in which I professionally believe and understand. If test proponents could see what a third grade class looks like on the first day of school, maybe they'd begin to understand my fury. These are worldly innocent children; ego-centric and self-absorbed; yet delightful, creative and unique. That's the way it is with children this age, as it has always been. For some reason, we, as a society, have deemed third grade as THE YEAR OF RECKONING in life. We demand that these innocent souls shed their innocence and dress-up in adult clothing. We are demanding more, pound-for-pound, of our eight and nine year-olds than we are of grown adults in high-pressured work environments. It makes me furious and makes me more determined to be a buffer, one who interprets this alien world to and creates a safety zone for these wonderful people.


But even that's getting harder and harder to do.


Make no mistake about it. Third grade teachers are feeling piled-onto as well. Then again, all teachers are under assault from all sides right now. These attacks (teacher contracts, accountability, evaluations, test scores, salary, pensions, pointless mandates, etc) are brain-numbing, maddening, and just plain sad.


We teach for the children. We choose to care.


Many times, I think the rest of the world operates under a different broad understanding, "We CHOSE to care."

Thom Ryder

http://www.roanoke.com/editorials/wb/304352

Weigh in on Proposed Change to SOL Testing Program

This article was lifted from the VEA website. If you're a member, stop by the VEA website and vote in our special run-off election. You'll need your membership number to vote.

Weigh in on Proposed Change to SOL Testing Program

At the last Virginia Board of Education meeting, a proposal was made to eliminate the third grade social studies SOL test. Social studies testing is not required under NCLB, and most states do not have a required social studies test. If the third grade social studies test is eliminated, students will continue to take other required third grade tests. Additionally, annual testing in history will still occur in the other currently tested grade levels. Last year, there was a 93 percent pass rate statewide on the third grade social studies test. The state superintendent has proposed that the third grade reading test be modified to include passages based on the social studies SOL content standards as a means of ensuring that the content be taught.

Proponents of eliminating the test argue that removing the third grade social studies test will allow teachers and schools to focus both time and resources on literacy. Teachers will be given greater flexibility to embed social studies content into their reading curricula. Proponents also suggest that the $380,000 savings will allow the state to update and improve tests required under NCLB. The proposed elimination of this test is in response to a request from school superintendents to reduce the testing load.

Opponents of eliminating the third grade social studies test include the Virginia Consortium of Social Studies Specialists and College Educators. This advocacy group acknowledges that the current method of multiple choice testing is flawed, but is concerned that if the test is dropped, social studies will be under-emphasized in elementary school curricula. They worry that social studies instructional time will be reduced, and that ultimately, student performance in future grades will suffer. Additional concerns have been raised that the elimination of this test will simply make the fourth grade test even more broad and difficult to prepare for by adding four more years of content to this test.

The Board will make a final decision at its June 25 meeting. The VEA is currently formulating a position, and needs input from teachers. Please click here to participate in a short survey to help us in this effort.

Most Likely To Succeed

The New Yorker has published a piece by Malcolm Gladwell that delves into the murky world of determining who is and who isn't effective as a teacher called "Most Likely to Succeed." Gladwell compares predicting who will be an excellent teacher with determining who will succeed as an NFL quarterback. He notes that NFL scouts have failed more often than not when trying project NFL success onto a college quarterback (Jim Druckenmiller anyone?). So it is with projecting the success of teachers.

Gladwell also looks at some pioneering research being done at UVA's Curry School that is trying to identify what is excellent teaching. He takes that research a step further and suggests that what we sorely need is an open enrollment of teachers, credentials aren't important. Enrollees would need to complete a rigorous apprenticeship where they must prove themselves effective by raising test scores by a significant amount or be released. Those who make it through the apprenticeship successfully would be richly compensated.

Currently, the salary structure of the teaching profession is highly rigid, and that would also have to change in a world where we want to rate teachers on their actual performance. An apprentice should get apprentice wages. But if we find eighty-fifth-percentile teachers who can teach a year and a half’s material in one year, we’re going to have to pay them a lot—both because we want them to stay and because the only way to get people to try out for what will suddenly be a high-risk profession is to offer those who survive the winnowing a healthy reward.

I remember when I was teaching in Albemarle County back in the late 1980's, the school board decided to do something about "bad" teachers, so they imposed a merit pay scheme. Turns out that so many teachers proved themselves meritorious that the school board was forced to pay out rewards to a whole lot more people than they anticipated. After a couple of years of providing a "healthy reward" to so many teachers, the school board abandoned the whole plan and went back to a more traditional teacher pay scale.

Merit pay schemes have always seemed like empty ideas to me. While the research going on at UVA is intriguing, do experts really know enough about what makes a great teacher to confidently identify it so that those teachers can be rewarded? What's with this idea of teaching a year and a half's material in one year? Doesn't the author realize that we teach rigidly prescribed amounts of material every year...no more, no less. Are we really going to base a reward system on what are arguably flawed tests. It's already sad enough that we place so much emphasis on them; is more emphasis a good thing?

These are all questions that came to my mind as I read Gladwell's piece. I would certainly reccommend you read the piece and form your own opinions. Feel free to deposit your comments here.

http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2008/12/15/081215fa_fact_gladwell?currentPage=7

Bail Out

Robert Reich, most famous for his time spent as a cabinet secretary in the Clinton administration, opined recently that, regarding public school education in our country, we're all out of whack. We bail out corporations, while we are starving and throttling our educational system.

Our preoccupation with the immediate crisis of financial capital is causing us to overlook the bigger crisis in America's human capital. While we commit hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars to Wall Street, we're slashing our outlays for public education.

Education is largely funded by state and local governments whose revenues are plummeting. As consumers cut back, state sales and income taxes are shrinking; three quarters of the states are already facing budget crises. State revenues account for about half of public school budgets and most funding of public colleges and universities. In addition, as home values drop, local property taxes take a hit. Local property taxes account for 40 percent of local school budgets, on average.

The result, across the nation: Teachers are being laid off and new hiring frozen, after-school programs cut, so called "noncritical" subjects like history eliminated, schools closed, and tuitions hiked at state colleges and universities.

It's absurd. We're bailing out every major bank to get financial capital flowing again. But we're squeezing the main sources of our nation's human capital. Yet America's future competitiveness and the standard of living of our people depend largely our peoples' skills, and our capacities to communicate and solve problems and innovate ­ not on our ability to borrow money.

Reich continued,

It's our human capital that's in short supply. And without adequate public funding, the supply will shrink further. Don't get me wrong: I'm not saying funding is everything when it comes to education. Obviously, accountability is critical. But without adequate funding we can't attract talented people into teaching, or keep class sizes small enough to give kids a real chance to learn, or provide them with a well-rounded curriculum, and ensure that every qualified young person can go to college.

So why are we bailing out Wall Street and not our nation's public schools and colleges? Partly because the crisis in financial capital is immediate while our human capital crisis is unfolding gradually. Headlines scream what's happening to our money but not to our kids.

As our state stares a $3.5 billion budget deficit in the face and as our school division considers what and whom will be axed, Reich's words ring with a sense of authenticity. When will people wake up and start investing in the foundation of education in our country?

Some will say that the educational system has all the money it needs and that there is tons of waste embedded within the system. As a teacher, I've learned that there is some merit to those arguments. Waste does exist in the educational structures, but that waste generally is does not filter down and enrich anyone at the teacher/student/classroom level.

The greatest waste both financially and instructionally is the propagation of the ridiculous national and state accountability systems. These mandates, which are easily recognized by their acronyms- SOL, NCLB, and AYP, strike fear into the hearts of communities, administrators, teachers, and students. The tacit threats attached to them have encouraged the development of a seemingly slimy accountability business resplendent with guides, formative assessments, data-driven analyzation tools, and testing materials all peddled to frightened school divisions by data sharks.

The ultimate result of this destructive movement, is that the real art and process of teaching has become hopelessly caged and filtered. The intentions may have originally been good, but the results have been destructive.

So I'm with Reich. We do need to bail out the public education system in America. We need to bail out of the myopic accountability mandates. Accountibility is important. Teachers must be accountable for what they teach, but parents and students must be held accountable for their end of the bargain as well. We need to bail out of inferior funding formulas for our schools. State and local governments must be held accountable for providing funding that is more than basic. The nonsensical SOQ game our state plays with public school funding as it seeks to further and further reduce and shirk its responsibility for fully funding its share of the budgets for our public schools needs to stop. We need to improve the physical infrastructure of our schools, reduce class size, fully fund preschool initiatives, and attract highly qualified professionals with highly attractive wages and benefits. Education needs to be the priority.

If you don't bail out a canoe as it charges head-long down a turbulent stream, it will eventually sink.

http://tpmcafe.talkingpointsmemo.com/2008/12/03/of_financial_capital_and_human/

Electronics electronics Electronics

There is little doubt that the 2008-2009 school year in Roanoke County is filled with new technology and new initiatives. ActivBoards have been placed in each regular elementary school classroom by utilizing a significant monetary investment. Northside High School also received new ActivBoards in every classroom as well. In addition, teachers at the majority of the elementary schools received NEW laptop computers for teacher use. In an ordinary year, that electronic shift alone would be enough. But this year, there's even more to electronic news. New email. New benchmark assessments. And new electronic gradebooks for elementary school teachers.

As you might expect with so much new technology rolling out at the same time, there were bound to be some bugs, despite the technology crews working hard to roll out systems and products. Over the past week or so, members of the RCEA have contacted our office with concerns about the electronic gradebook system. The concerns center around two issues. First, with four weeks past in the school year and the gradebook program only now coming online, teachers were concerned about how it would be possible to get caught up on the system. In fact, several suggested that perhaps the program should be scrapped for this year. The other main issue brought up was that assuming the program does successfully launch, teachers will not be able to access the system from home, forcing teachers to enter all grades at school. This becomes an especially important issue at elementary schools where a teacher may, if lucky, have 30 minutes of unencumbered time during the contract school day. Thus, the data entry aspect of the job will be shifted to after school/after contract hours. Most teachers currently enjoy the flexibility to stay at school to finish grading/planning or taking the work home to work the unofficial day in a more relaxed setting.

These concerns were shared with Dr. Lange, and she was very understanding and responsive. Elementary principals have been given several options for the electronic gradebook. The most basic option is either have the entire faculty use it or have the entire school wait until next year to launch it. If the gradebook is launched this year, there are several options on how to handle the opening of the school year. Perhaps the most attractive option is to continue assigning grades in the usual manner, average the grades as usual, and then just enter the letter grade for this nine weeks on the electronic report card. Then ,beginning next nine weeks, the entire process can be accomplished on the electronic system.

Regarding the ability to work on grades at home with the system. Dr. Lange reported to us that at this time, it is not possible due to system security. to access the system from home in real time. She said that the technology staff is working on that issue.

If you are an elementary teacher, you may wish to work with your building principal to help make the best decision for your school. Please let the RCEA know if you have any further concerns. (ThomRyder:Newt999@gmail.com)

RCEA Retirement Reception 2008

The RCEA held its annual retirement reception on May 19, 2008 at Hidden Valley Middle School. The organization honored the member retirees, recognized employees with 25 years of service to the profession, and announced winners of our 2008 RCEA Memorial Scholarships.

Our gathering was a special time for retirees to share a few moments with the audience in an intimate setting. Without a doubt, the audience felt the power and emotion of the day leaving memories that will last.

The RCEA Memorial Scholarships were awarded to three Roanoke County high school seniors who plan to pursue a career in education. Ali Broyles and Erika Troia from Hidden Valley High School , as well as Meredith Buckley from Glenvar High School were this year's recipients of our awards. These students were most impressive, and it is our genuine hope that they consider returning to Roanoke County when they've finished their college degree programs.

Betty Mosier (retired from Mountain View Elementary) serenaded the gathering with lovely piano.

Johnny Simpson took charge of distributing flowers.

Ali Broyles was one of three recipients of our scholarships.

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