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Tag Archives: teacher morale
Let Us Not Be Blamed: A Meditation on the State of Teacher Unionism, Corporate America, and Poverty
Summary: Unions are targeted by corporate based reformers as the bad guy, and do need to take better charge of the debate, but the real culprit at base is the political failure to impact poverty. Maureen (we shall call her) … Continue reading
Schools and Politics: Seattle Teachers Strike and Aim to Be Players
Summary: The Seattle Teachers’ strike has ended with advances in salary and working conditions, but also in agreements that address quality of schooling for kids, such as disproportionate discipline for kids of color and, in general, suspension as a tool … Continue reading
Posted in Schools and Politics
Tagged at risk students, Dale Russakoff, disproportionate discipline, education and politics, empowering teachers, low-income students, parent support, school funding, school reform, Seattle Teachers strike, teacher morale, teacher pay, teachers' unions, Testing
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School Bureaucracy: Behind the Walkout at Garfield High
Summary: The common practice in school districts that adjusts student-teacher ratios a month into school retards the learning process, distracts teachers and counselors from more important work, and in the end simply harms students, some more than others. The practice … Continue reading
School Reform: Where Less May be More in the Refinement of Teaching
Summary: Teachers in countries that surpass the US in student test scores spend half or less the time in direct instruction than do American teachers. Regular collegial consultation and feedback, for novice and veteran alike, is part of how that … Continue reading
Posted in School Reform, Uncategorized
Tagged Building a Better Teacher, Deborah Ball, direct instruction, Elizabeth Green, jugyokenkyu, lesson study for teachers, Sara Mosle, school reform, student teacher ratio, student test scores, teacher collaboration, teacher morale, teacher professionalism, teacher training
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School Reform: The Dance of Competencies and Traditional Grading
Summary: Though the focus on narrow reading, writing, and mathematics competencies serves employers and highlights the need to improve skills, it may also reflect the mirage that traditional grading has become. Sometimes one has to step outside of a familiar … Continue reading
School Reform: Build In Support and They Will Come
Summary: Presidential directives and court cases are useful, but good teachers know schools of poverty will burn out their energies without well designed support for their efforts. The drumbeat of reform has a new cause. Since quality teachers are the … Continue reading
School Reform: Yup, Some Regular Every Day Schools Are Doing It
Summary: One low income school stages a dramatic turnaround. How it was done maps out a route that other reformed schools have followed, yet poses dilemmas for the choice makers. The Seattle area’s White Center Heights Elementary prior to the … Continue reading
School Reform: Teacher Entrepreneurs Need Not Apply
Summary: Innovation and entrepreneurship by teachers tend to be dead on arrival because of a broader school culture which favors hierarchical directives. How are teachers to be established as the cornerstone player in a decentralized school culture, as I argue … Continue reading
Posted in School Bureaucracy, School Reform
Tagged administrative style, communication in schools, empowering teachers, entrepreneurship and teachers, flat oranizations, innovation in schools, school administrator training, school reform, teacher morale, teacher motivation, teacher professionalism
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School Reform: Testing and Mistaking the Forest for the Trees
Summary: The struggles in our schools will not be won by resort to more standardized testing, but by a recommitment to the central role of the teacher in the classroom. The stories of impactful teachers are legion; the myth of … Continue reading
School Reform: Testing and Data — Does the Tail Wag the Dog? Part B
Summary: A continuation of the last post which explores the relationship between testing, the data it collects, and the legitimate role and limits of both in school reform. Already the digital data perspective has altered how we think of and … Continue reading
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