and to the people (i.e. Michelle Rhee) who have responded to him.
Rhetoric. President Obama’s words on education last night were beautiful and clear.
But they were obvious.
-That teachers need to be respected.
-That students need to be held to high expectations.
-That teachers are important in a student’s life and that all students deserve great teachers.
Ten, even five, years ago-these words would have been calls to action. New, galvanizing ideas. But the campaign to change the view of the teacher in the public’s eye is over. We have accepted this call to action. It is all over magazines and the news media. We know that teachers are important. Ever since I began teaching five years ago I have been thanked endlessly for the work that I do. I am admired and respected.
So the question then is…how do we reach this vision that we have accepted?
Many people have offered answers. They all claim to be right. The solution our leaders pick is a reflection of their view on education and schooling in our country. It is not necessarily a reflection of what is absolutely right. Because-is there an absolute right?
For example, Michelle Rhee wants to pay teachers for their performance. Let me tell you why I disagree.
I will first state a perspective I am coming from. I have been told, by supervisors, other teachers, and all kinds of data, that I can be an effective teacher. But do not ever tell me it is all because of me. My students succeed because their teacher is part of a highly effective team. My students grow in reading because 3 of them work daily with B.K, the brilliant and reflective reading recovery teacher. My lessons are stronger and more engaging because I plan with K. R. and K.D, two of the best teachers I have ever worked with. I watch these women teach and I become better. My students love math and get better in it because A.C is, well, my colleague calls her a “child whisperer.” I watch her teach for five minutes and my practice improves. My students are held to high expectations in a safe and welcoming environment because C.S. and R.J. hold them to these expectations in the hallway and do whatever they can so that I can watch other teachers and develop myself.
So if you want to pay me, you better find a way to pay all of my teammates that I have just mentioned. You will have to find out using some statistical method the value and percent contributed by each teammate to each student’s growth. And pay us accordingly. Then I accept your solution.
In fact, professional learning communities are valued in education research and in schools. Yet you know want to pay ME for MY students’ success? Shouldn’t the lingo be OUR students’ success?
How is it that in so many other ways our country values collaboration, except in classrooms? In the business world we encourage people to work and strategize together. People usually work in teams. No lawyer that I know does a case all by herself. She works with the other lawyers and paralegals in her law firm. As a doctoral student at an Ivy League school, we had mandatory discussion groups. Because our professors knew that our ideas were richer when thrown around with others. Athletes on team sports must work together. Yes, each one of them must be proficient, but they are better because they have their strengths combined.
As teachers, we create classroom communities premised on the notion of working together and working as a team. We work hard to teach children to work together, in pairs, in groups. We teach children the value of knowing other cultures and other kinds of people because our differences are strengths. Numerous teachers across the country have posters hanging in their rooms that read “There is no I in TEAM.” I make one adendum: There is no I in TEAM, except when it comes to your teachers’ effectiveness and when it comes to you taking a test.
Our government can’t measure collaboration. So instead they choose to measure something they can-an individual teacher’s effectiveness based on her student’s test scores and/or other achievement data. But that doesn’t mean it’s right. And it doesn’t mean it will increase student performance. But I guess it also doesn’t mean it won’t.
And it is the same with student testing. Our government tests students because that is the only way it can “scientifically” hold teachers accountable. The only way we can “scientifically” see growth. And while I absolutely do believe that testing gives us valuable information and that proficiency on a test is important (although we can see how even “proficiency” is a subjective term dictated by politicians in re-election years) testing doesn’t improve education. In fact, it doesn’t even force teachers and educators to improve.
And why is measuring the answer? Will that really hold the thousands and thousands of teachers and parents and children and school systems in this decentralized nation more accountable? And furthermore, will measuring actually make students better educated?
Strong, diverse curriculum would. Teachers who stay in the classroom and gain experience and knowledge and who have time to revise their thinking and teaching would. Teacher education programs and schools that gradually release teachers into the community with heavy support and mentorship would. Owning the fact that teaching is a cyclical and reflective process, in which we get better with time and revision. Like a good piece of writing. That there will occasionally be a Harper Lee- coming in with one big bang and fizzling away – or a Jonathan Safran Foer- sitting down and writing a great book in one quick write. But most of us won’t be. And that’s okay. We won’t be perfect. We will make mistakes. We will not connect with every single child. We will help most children grow leaps and bounds. And some will leave us as missed opportunities.
But we will have come to work and tried our best every day. And we will have grown for it. And we will be better teachers the next day, the next week, the next year because we have.
Teachers who spend as much time as you obviously do thinking about the art and the craft of teaching, do succeed. Staying open and collaborating with other teachers AND with your students is all you need to do each day. You clearly do that and if others are doing the same, the future of education looks much brighter than one might otherwise think. Thanks for your thoughtfulness.
Isn’t there another team member? The child. Obvious, maybe, but there is no team or success without everyone’s willing participation. Including the child’s. Teams that make progress toward their goals succeed in part because they understand (intuitively or explicitly) the dimensions of all team members’ skills. And so also for understanding the skills of each child, how they might develop and change, and what resistance might be present. I think you very perceptively understand that the ‘big lie’ in contemporary education reformism (of the Rhee variety) is the proposition that individual teachers are the primary determinant of ‘success’ – defined only as performance on tests. Jaron Lanier writes that “we ask teachers to teach to standardized tests so a student will look good to an algorithm” – in other words, reformism debases the humanity of education by reducing teaching to judgment rendered by a machine. Because groups (teams) are entirely unpredictable, free, and thus incapable of being evaluated by the machine, your thesis that it is the team that matters is radical and threatening to the emerging status quo in education. Excellent!