December 13, 2011

NEA as Reformer?

Marc Comtois

The national NEA's Commission on Effective Teachers and Teaching published a report, "Transforming Teaching: Connecting Professional Responsibility with Student Learning," (PDF) that lays out their vision for modernizing and reforming the teaching profession.

The Commission laid out three guiding principles upon which the teaching profession should be based: Student learning is at the center of everything a teacher does; Teachers take primary responsibility for student learning; Effective teachers share in the responsibility for teacher selection, evaluation, and dismissal. It recommends a better system of teacher development (including reforming teacher certification programs), the creation of National Teaching Standards, peer-review based teacher evaluations, and they even recommend an end to the traditional step-contract. As Rick Hess (a member of the advisory committee, incidentally) says, these ideas and proposals are all well and good, but:

And what will the NEA actually do with its big report? Will the locals and state affiliates that drive the NEA take the effort seriously, or will it gather cyber-dust on the cyber-shelf? Is the national NEA serious about any of this, or is just an effort to deflect criticism and slow down the push for policies designed to reshape teacher evaluation or pay? How many teachers does it expect to actually be moved out of the profession under peer review? How seriously should we take its talk about removing licensure barriers or closing down lousy teacher prep programs?
We'll see.

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"The Commission laid out three guiding principles upon which the teaching profession should be based: Student learning is at the center of everything a teacher does; Teachers take primary responsibility for student learning; Effective teachers share in the responsibility for teacher selection, evaluation, and dismissal."

Did the report mention the current NEA guiding principles, as applied in Rhode Island public schools?

1. No teacher should be fired for any reason.
2. Pay raises should come annually and automatically.
3. Students? What students?

The only thing NEARI has ever reformed is the pay of its gangster union leadership - upward.

Posted by: Dan at December 13, 2011 12:06 PM

When is the noxious, once ubiquitous duck loving Pat Crowley going to be featured on America's Most Wanted following his complete disappearance from the scene after the crushing he got on the pensions?
Guess every duck has his day to quack...
LOL.

Posted by: Tommy Cranston at December 13, 2011 2:17 PM

Maybe Crowley(and Walsh)are still stunned that Gov.Gump,who was supposed to be their obedient court fool,turned out to be a completely unpredictable and uncontrollable fool.
Who knows?
In any event,Crowley has been kind of scarcely seen and heard from of late.

Posted by: joe bernstein at December 13, 2011 4:34 PM
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