Advancing the Teaching Profession

So We Should All Really Be Interviewing Ariel

Check out the new post over in Ariel Sacks’ phenomenal blog “On the Shoulders of Giants.” Ariel, a dedicated and talented young New York City teacher, represented the Teacher Leaders Network and CTQ’s TeacherSolutions 2030 initiative at a recent Ford Foundation gathering on the Strategic Management of Human Capital.
 
As the single teacher among university professors, foundation officers, education economists, and policymakers, Ariel, alone in this group, experiences daily the most challenging of environments — a classroom of students in a high-needs school who rely on her to provide them with the skills and confidence to succeed. I was thrilled that the other participants recognized this value, and second Lisa Delpit’s suggestion, that all of us in education should “really be interviewing Ariel” and all of the other highly accomplished teachers who tackle the highest hurdles for the sake of their students’ learning. If you need any further proof of the value of teacher experience, simply skim the wisdom Ariel shares throughout the rest of her post.
 
Ford is one of the few foundations focused on not just recruiting talent for high need schools, but also retaining that talent. Watch out for TeacherSolutions: Teacher Working Conditions 2.0 — another new initiative of CTQ. Ford is supporting CTQ to not only deepen our understanding of working conditions — but also to bring the voices of other expert teachers to light around the issues they encounter daily and that impact student learning and teacher retention. 
 
In other words, how do we populate our classrooms with more Ariel Sacks? I know CTQ’s emerging work will not offer any silver bullet solutions, but I also know that all of us who strive for equity in American education, and all of the students whose lives you have touched, stand – humbled and awed – on your shoulders, Ariel.

Strategic Management of Human Capital: Thinking a Bit Deeper in the District of Columbia (Part 5)

For the past several weeks I have been posting — as well as many others — on the merits of Michelle Rhee’s efforts to overhaul the human capital system in the District of Columbia. The October 9th Education Gadfly, in predictable fashion, offers “three cheers” for Rhee in her plans to bypass the current district-union agreement, totally deregulate teacher recruitment and certification, give principals more authority to hire and fire, and pay teachers a great deal more if they raise student test scores. I believe that much needs to be done to shake up the moribund District of Columbia system of public education. However, the recent postings of Eduwonkette (October 6th and 8th) reveal the serious problems of blanket deregulation and gunslinger approaches to transforming the teaching profession.

Just think Wall Street.

With her usual eloquent prose (as opposed to the sardonic type used by the Gadfly), she tells the story of how expert teacher Art Siebens has been dismissed by Rhee and her new system, leaving students and parents frustrated and angry.  Instead of the rancorous rhetoric offered up in the usual Gadfly column, the Edwonkette offers up fundamental facts. She writes that in his 13-year stint in DCPS 72% of Siebens’ students passed the AP Biology exam. Just as stunningly, while Rhee’s administrative team identified Siebens as a failing teacher, he received an Advanced Placement Recognition Award from the College Board.

Our own work in the area of the strategic management of human capital, supported in large part by the Rose Community Foundation, has pushed our thinking and has surfaced a few suggestions thus far. For example, teacher evaluation must change and educators be held more accountable, but many principals, due to their own lack of preparation and support, are not up to the task of effectively assessing teacher performance. I wonder if a human capital system in public education could be built more effectively on identifying excellent teachers and giving them, not top-down administrators, more authority in cultivating collective responsibility among educators, parents, and students. Granted, action needs to be taken — and fast — but I suspect there are many excellent teachers in DC who are ready to take the lead — and would ensure that colleagues like Art Siebens would be rewarded, not fired.