Returning common sense to education in Illinois

[kpete]

(a little birdie told me to share this with Illinois, kp)


Returning common sense to education in Illinois
BY PAUL HORTON August 21, 2013 5:34PM

Updated: August 21, 2013 6:05PM

Because Mayor Rahm Emanuel and the Obama administration have failed to find practical solutions to education issues in Chicago and nationally, I would like to propose a few. These are necessary steps to working toward more equity in education for those who are underserved in the city and in other underfunded districts in the state.

1) U.S. Senator Dick Durbin needs to negotiate for and end the No Child Left Behind and The Race to the Top (RTTT) mandates that include mandatory adherence to the Common Core learning standards, standardized assessments based on those standards, and value-added teacher assessments based on student gains on the same tests. There is no empirical evidence to support the validity of high stakes testing; there is no empirical evidence to support the validity of value-added teacher assessments; and the Common Core standards, despite all of the hoo-ha, are neither internationally benchmarked or somehow “higher level standards.” The scam is that 70 percent of the students in New York who took Common Core tests created by the company Pearson Education failed because they were not adequately prepared due to a rush to implement the standards. And, the New York education superintendent reportedly cut the scores to create more failure to justify his and the Obama Administration’s education policies. All federal monies that remain from previously appropriated RTTT funds should be distributed to underserved school districts in each state to rehire teacher and support staff, not for IT, administration, or new construction. This is where the congressional conference committee negotiations will separate compassionate legislators from the kooks.

2) The City of Chicago needs to direct its inspector general to account for all of the money the school system was ethically obligated to put into Chicago Teachers’ Pension Fund, every penny. The city shortchanged the fund over many years, even if it didn’t violate the letter of the law. Before the mayor and the City Council fund any more non-educational projects with tax-increment financing money, the pension fund needs to be paid back. The city needs to own up to the mess that it has created and stop blaming teachers.

3) The Illinois teachers unions, both IEA and IFT (including CTU), need to step up and assist administrators by participating in stringent evaluations of teacher performance. The AFT, in the spirit of past leader Albert Shanker, developed the Toledo Plan that has been used very successfully in many districts across the country, including the exemplary public system in Montgomery County, Maryland. Master teachers in this system work along side administrators to assess ineffective teaching.

4) We need an elected Chicago Board of Education. The current regime is not accountable to the people of Chicago. When our mayor can wheel and deal resources, he can coerce aldermen to get his way. We can no longer stand by and allow this to happen. The recent demolition of a community center at Whittier School in Pilsen is but one example of the near dictatorial impunity of our mayor, our CPS administration, and the CPS school board.

for the rest:
http://www.suntimes.com/news/otherviews/22045807-452/returning-common-sense-to-education-in-illinois.html
Paul Horton is a history teacher at the University of Chicago Laboratory Schools and state director of the Illinois Council for History Education.

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