Teachers unions in two states have apparently decided their best route to attack the $4.35 billion Race to the Top (RTTT) Fund, the largest discretionary federal investment in public education ever, is to impugn it as “top-down” management.
I don’t get it. Aren’t all federal programs inherently top-down? Isn’t that what makes it federal, as opposed [...]
All Posts Tagged: 'Teachers Unions'
Top-Down Federal Programs
Extending School Time
A new report by the Center for American Progress on district-union partnerships to extend school time profiles three models, including Brooklyn Generation. More about Brooklyn Generation and the Generation Schools model, which extends time for students but not for teachers, in this ES report and on our online discussion, which you can read here.
Also, tomorrow [...]
QUICK Hits
Are promoting teacher quality and promoting equal access to good teachers mutually exclusive? Ed Trust doesn’t think so. (Education Trust)
If parents are still their child’s first and most important teacher, will proposed Delaware legislation help them play a more active role? (Delaware Online)
Could the head of a teachers union find happiness running a school system? [...]
Rifts in RIFs
As school districts faced budget cuts all across the country, they were contractually obligated to issue Reduction in Force (RIF) notifications to teachers they might not be able to afford in 2009–10. The process districts must go through to layoff workers is typically spelled out in the negotiated agreements. Here’s the relevant passage from the [...]
Charter Schools and Unions—One Size Fits All??
Unionization of charter schools seems to be the hot topic these days. A recent NYT article raises the critical question:
“…whether unions will strengthen the charter movement by stabilizing its young, often transient teaching force, or weaken it by preventing administrators from firing ineffective teachers and imposing changes they say help raise achievement, like an extended [...]
Dancing Around the Elephant in the Room
A few weeks ago, conservative education historian/contrarian Diane Ravitch was asked to judge a “best education reform idea” contest. The first entry came from the “Center for Union Facts,” a sort of clearinghouse for union-hating agitprop. The “Center” proposed to—and I’m not paraphrasing here—”demonize” teachers unions. With billboards and radio and stuff. Ravitch noted that [...]
Kahlenberg on KIPP
Rich Kahlenberg published a review of Jay Matthews’ new KIPP book (Work Hard. Be Nice.) in the Washington Post Book World back of the Washington Post Outlook section yesterday. Rich spends the first half of the review giving Jay good marks before devoting the second half to warning readers that:
…there are also two misguided “lessons” [...]
"would not benefit…"
A little after noon today, the Washington Teachers Union (WTU), an affiliate of the American Federation of Teachers, sent an email to its members that begins as follows:
Dear [member],
The Office of the State Superintendent of Education (OSSE) has proposed regulations that would require a DC Public School (DCPS) teacher to demonstrate effectiveness as a condition [...]
Reality Time
Matt Yglesias observes the spate of union-sponsored Fenty-bashing at the Democratic national convention, driven in large part by the Fenty administration’s proposal to pay teachers a lot more money in exchange for more accountability and less job security, and doesn’t like what he sees. (Side note: let’s all agree to apply some standards of objectivity [...]
More Teachers See Unions as "Absolutely Essential"
In recent decades, America has experienced a steady de-unionization of the private sector workforce. This is a real problem, particularly in an era of declining economic security and increasing inequality (problems that partially stem from de-unionization itself). The public sector, by contrast, has pretty much maintained a steady level of unionization, in part because governments [...]
The Wages of Wynn
In a race that received a significant amount of national attention and an influx of outside money, Donna Edwards defeated eight-term incumbent Albert Wynn for the Democractic nomination to represent Maryland’s overwhelmingly big-D Democratic 4th Congressional district. Edwards was heavily backed by progressive labor interests, including the SEIU, who saw Wynn as too pro-business. Not [...]
Breaking the Greed / Virtue Dichotomy in Teacher Pay
Commenting on the new issue of Quality Counts, which compares states on teacher pay measures and suggests that teachers make less than comparable professions, AFTie Ed says:
It leaves open the question of why people go into teaching. As the song says “it’s not about a salary, it’s all about reality, teachers teach and do the [...]
Unions, Pay for Performance and No Grapes
A new report from the Citizen’s Commission on Civil Rights highlights four types of teacher union initiatives that have the “dual purpose” of improving student learning and improving the working conditions of teachers: pay for performance, decreasing the role of seniority in hiring practices, involving parents and the community in decision-making and enhancing teacher [...]
All Competition is Not the Same
Ezra Klein critiques a recent WSJ op-ed$ about income inequality and the return on human capital from Cato’s Brink Lindsey, which concludes:
Those interested in reducing meaningful economic inequality would thus be well advised to focus on education reform. And forget about adding new layers of bureaucracy and top-down controls. Real improvements will come from challenging [...]
Souljah-ing the Teachers Unions
Ezra Klein follows up on last week’s discussion of the lamentable tendency of left-leaning pundits to burnish their independent credentials by mindlessly bashing teachers unions and/or adopting other conservative eduction tropes.
As regular Quick & ED readers know, that doesn’t mean teachers unions should be immune from criticism–far from it. I myself have engaged in a [...]
You’re Fired (Not!)
This post by AFTie Ed last week was laugh-out-loud funny but also made a point well worth remembering:
Wait, you mean you can’t just snap your hand and get rid of non union employees you don’t like? Wow!
There are lots of reasons lousy and downright horrid people often don’t get fired, and most of those reasons [...]
Debating NCLB with Progressives
I’m late in getting to this interesting conversation that Ganesh Sitamaran and Jason Spitalnick have been having over at TPM Cafe about NCLB and the future of education reform thinking. I don’t know whether to think that AFTie Ed’s and many of their commenters’ conclusions that the posts are somehow teacher or union-bashing is a [...]
The Unions Come Clean
Over at EdWise, Leo Casey finally reveals the answer to the Master’s degree mystery. It’s well worth reading, because Leo describes exactly what’s wrong with teacher policy today. But first, a few house-cleaning items:
Leo alleges that the Clotfelder, Ladd, and Vigdor (CLV) study cited in the previous post refutes the findings and recommendations in the [...]
Radio Silence from Teachers Unions
After near 24 hours, no response yet from my challenge to teachers union bloggers to defend the indefensible–spending billions of dollars of taxpayer’s and teachers money on Master’s degrees that don’t improve teaching. (It’s possible ,of course, that Leo Casey is simply in the middle of composing an 8,000-word response and has been held up [...]
Lowering Student Loan Default Rates: What One Consortium of Historically Black Institutions Did to Succeed 
College and Career-Ready: Using Outcomes Data to Hold High Schools Accountable for Student Success
03/19/10 | Ben Miller is quoted on college graduation rates and the NCAA Tournament in the Detroit Free Press.
03/19/10 | Linda Perlstein links to Education Sector's "College- and Career-Ready" event.
03/17/10 | Ben Miller's column on graduation rates and NCAA Tournament eligibility is mentioned on The Wall Street Journal's The Daily Fix.
03/17/10 | Kevin Carey's critique of Diane Ravitch's latest book is quoted in Doublethink's Conventional Folly blog.
03/15/10 | Ben Miller pens an op-ed for US News & World Report on using graduation rates to determine NCAA Tournament eligibility.