Comments on: NYC charter school's $125,000 experiment
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- Very interesting piece on the value of paying teachers over 100k a year when WI teachers are fighting for their collective bargaining rights. Although I see the value in this experiment, I did identify a major issue with one of Joel Klein's statements he made regarding tenure. When asked how difficult it is for a teacher to get tenure, Klein responded with "If you have a pulse, you get tenure." Now, this may be true in the New York Public School system, but this is definitely not the case around the nation and I hope viewers recognize this sentiment is not accurate by ANY means in other parts of the country. I teach in Minnesota and have many friends who are continuously laid off year after year by their principals in order to avoid them receiving tenure. They are then hired back the following year, and they end up going through this process year after year. Although I think tenure is unnecessary because it does keep ineffective teachers in the classroom, Klein's statement misleads others in thinking tenure is incredibly easy to come by. Unfortunately our nation is so narrow-minded and when people hear definite statements like this, it stays with them and they develop a bias against all arguments otherwise. So, good piece, but I think 60 Minutes could have at least identified and recognized that the concept of receiving tenure is not the same everywhere else in the country.
Joel Klein, who stepped down in January after eight years as the New York City schools chancellor. - Reply to this comment
- You teachers vehemently defending yourself didn't watch this report very closely, or just can't let your guard down enough to see what is happening at this school. Short of the flat-out violent psychos, ANY group of kids can be engaged and won over, but you have to really prepare. You have to sell your subject like you're selling a product or service to an executive board, with passion and a clear line of presentation. I can remember exactly two teachers in my entire 7th-12th grade experience who did that. Something tells me the odds haven't improved since then.
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- Another hatchet job; chock full of half-truths and mistruths, all designed to advance an agenda that Unions are the problem, teachers should have no protection from the whims of incompetent administrators or the political winds. The truth is, in K-12 education, tenure only provides for a due process hearing, not a lifetime job. The truth is, if a principal can't remove an incompetent teacher for cause, the principal is incompetent. Your reporter says only seven people were removed for cause last year, then goes on to say that at TEP in just one year, two teachers were removed. Why not be honest and talk about the number of teachers that do not continue into the second or the third year at public schools, which is certainly higher than just two. Had those two teachers been removed at the end of their first year in public schools, it seems your reporter would not have counted them as let go. The truth is, that it takes three years of supervised teaching to achieve tenure and the DOE is the one at fault for granting tenure if it is not deserved. Joel Klein was the chancellor for eight years. Why did he wait until just before leaving to decide that how tenure is earned, within exactly the same rules as before, needed to be more strenuous? The truth is, if anyone let the children of New York City down, it was Joel Klein, who has left the system in a shambles after multiple series of reorganizations, none of which were done well enough to become lasting, and it was Joel Klein who was unable to properly supervise a system as large as New York's even though other Chancellors have done an admirable job. Perhaps if Joel Klein had any real education credentials, he would have understood the issues and the problems better, rather than simply resorting to a "blame the teacher in the classroom" mentality. When the Yankees don't measure up, it's the manager who gets fired first. Joel Klein should have been let go years ago.
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- After watching your show concerning the TEP program and noting that even after all the wonderful individualized effort on the part of the carefully chosen teachers, the standardized testing scores were still lacking. When will someone wake up and realize that until something can be done about the culture at home of the children it will remain an uphill battle for us as educators (yes, I am a veteran educator). I work in a district that is nearly 50% economically disadvantaged and I make 37% of that $125,000, I am not tenured, not in a union, do not have an aide; therefore, I work harder in order for my students to succeed. And by the way, I find it appalling that someone that makes $12-15 million dollars a year would question the motives behind a program that would pay these teachers $125,000 a year-i.e. Katie Couric?!?
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- Do the math--247 students and 15 teachers...16.5 students per class?
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- I'm a teacher in Kansas. I think it is very important that people note the difference between Tenure and Due Process. We have due process in Kansas. That means that there is a process in place to get rid of bad teachers. If administrators would follow the process, bad teachers would not be in the classroom. Your show mentioned the the process is to hard to follow. That is just an excuse for administrators not to do their job. They get paid to make sure they are doing everything they can to get rid of bad teachers. No excuses. What we need is a show on the administrators. I have only had two written evaluations since 1994. To top that we now have what they call 3 minute walk throughs. I've had one since this was implemented and they only stayed about 30 seconds.
If we get rid of Tenure or Due Process, teachers will not speak up for what is right or wrong in schools (which is usually done by the best teachers). Why will they no longer speak out? For fear they will lose their jobs. This will only hurt the children. We have seen a great increas in administrators who only have 3 years teaching experience and have no idea what true teaching looks like. Their ego's get in the way of what is right. It is a very scary time to be a teacher. Hopefully we can do stories on both sides of the issue to better inform the public. - Reply to this comment
- Wow! It wasn't too hard to see what your agenda was with this story! What gaping holes! Why not interview AT LEAST ONE public school teacher and/or administrator? Why not correctly define the term "tenure"? Explain the three year process it takes to achieve tenure. Why not explain to viewers what the term "due process" means and that the responsibility of finding teachers unsatisfactory is on the administrators to keep accurate records with concrete examples of unsatisfactory progress (whether a teacher has tenure or not)? How about explaining that the 125k comes from taxpayers.....the same taxpayers that are paying 42k for the beginning teacher? How would taxpayers feel about paying ALL NYC teachers 125k? Ha! Fat chance. And finally, this principal gives himself four years to achieve progress...why not afford the same time frame to his teachers?! This was a shoddy piece of journalism. You could have at least made a feeble attempt at balancing out the voices you presented with the voices of real teachers who don't teach in cookie cutter, nicey-nice environments where the students are oh so eager to learn..where, by the way, the test scores are still higher than they are in your dog and pony show school. Pathetic.
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- If this country would go to the THE model with teachers working 80 to 90 hours a week, wouldn't they then be neglecting their own children and families?
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- This presentation was disappointing because it took the easy, politically correct approach. Blame the teachers and if you throw money at the problem, it will go away. The problem that politicians and 60 Minutes ignored is that parent involvement is the biggest factor in the success of the child. No mention was made about how these kids were selected for this school and whether or not the parents were required to sign a contract pledging their involvement. Also, when the principle was asked should he be fired since the school had disappointing results in the first year, he answered that if in 4 years there are no results, he should be terminated. He didn't mention that the contract with the city is a 5 year contract with one year gone. Charter schools are money making scams and it is politically expedient to attack teachers for the failure of our family structure and society. The charter school concept is a convenient tag line for politicians, but they have not proven to be successful. Also, Charter schools can expel students. They wait 6 months so that they get their money which is paid on a student by student basis and requires the student to be there for 6 months.
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- It's ironic but he's putting himself and his school above the others because he holds teachers accountable. But, scores were low and he's talking about waiting 4 more years before holding himself accountable...As an educator I know that there are no quick fixes and learning can be a journey...but with so many people talking about their new formula's for quick results and then they don't get the results...It's sad to see so many people be sooo superior about their methods because improvement is not as easy as it looks.
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