Michelle Rhee is my new Super Hero! Every School District in this country needs someone like her. Our kids suffer daily at the hands of many incompetent teachers and an incompetent system that is controlled by a union that cares nothing about educating our kids. Hooray for Michelle!!!
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Poke ‘Em in the Eye Award to Another Educator
Date: Sunday, July 25, 2010, 12:22 PM EDT, 12:22 PM EDT from Rob in Annapolis
On June 16 of this year, I awarded a Poke ‘Em in the Eye Award to Eva Moskowitz of New York City for her tireless devotion to the schoolchildren of that city and for her winning the battle against the bureaucrats of the Education Department who are determined to see her charter schools fail. Today, we have an educator who has just as much passion for her schoolchildren and who works just as tirelessly to make sure that there are qualified teachers in the classroom. Her name is Michelle Khee, and she is the Washington D.C. Schools Chancellor.
What did she do to deserve the award? Well, for starters, she just fired 241 teachers who were not fit to teach, including 165 who were considered poor under a new evaluation system. That sounds like common sense. However, in the wacky world of education, teachers don’t get fired, not even for incompetence. As a matter of fact, the New York City Department of Education just dismantled what were known as “rubber rooms.” Rubber rooms were like holding pens for cattle. They contained teachers accused of wrong doings or incompetence awaiting hearings by the Board of Education or trials by the New York City justice system. While waiting, in some cases for over five years, these teachers were getting full salary. This travesty of justice and economic prudence, which was halted because of a documentary about it that caused an uproar, is just one of many abuses across the country in which teachers are almost never let go no matter what they do. Rhee pointed out that in 2006, the year before she assumed the Schools Chancellor position, not one teacher was dismissed, and this was at a time when the Washington D.C. school system was one of the worst in the country regarding academic performance.
In addition to the 241 firings, Rhee has put on probation some 737 teachers who have been rated “minimally effective” by the IMPACT rating system instituted by Rhee and now used by D.C. schools. These teachers will have a year to shape up or be shipped out. Of course, the Washington Teachers’ Union is going to contest the firings in court. What else is new in teachers’ unions intransigence and myopia?
The outcome, therefore, remains to be seen as to whether Michelle Rhee’s unprecedented shake up of the education system in D.C. will stand. Here’s hoping for the children’s benefit that it does. As School Chancellor Rhee so poignantly points out:
Every child in a District of Columbia public school has a right to a highly effective teacher – in every classroom, of every school, of every neighborhood, of every ward, in this City. That is our commitment. Today… we take another step toward making that commitment a reality.
Michelle Rhee deserves this award for poking the teachers’ union in the eye by establishing consequences for poor performance in the classroom. All the Washington Teachers’ Union cares about is saving jobs. As an editorial in The Washington Post today concludes:
It's also hard to swallow the argument by some that Ms. Rhee is moving too fast. Whose children do they propose sit in the classrooms of ineffective teachers? It's worrisome enough to think about the children who will be taught this fall by teachers who have been judged "minimally ineffective." Union leaders have signaled plans to file grievances over all the dismissals. That's their right; but a better use of their time might be to work with Ms. Rhee to improve the performance of the 737 teachers in danger of losing their jobs next year.
Excellent, Rob.
As a retired public school teacher I am convinced that our only hope is to rescue our children from the public (government) schools and raise a godly generation. Please see "Call to Dunkirk" at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hRGZLSVph3A. Public schools cannot be redeemed. Saying we should not abandon them is like saying the passengers of the Titanic should have stayed aboard because the band was playing good music and the captain was a good man.
If you are in West Virginia, please also see http://insectman.us/exodus-mandate-wv/index.htm.
What our educational system needs is a return to basic education. When I was in school the NYC public schools were #1 in the nation, they taught basic reading, math, history, science. They taught a love of learning, a desire to find the answers, now all they teach is how to take and pass a test. No love of learning, and when theere is a problem throw money at it. It doesn't work, what you need is a commited teacher parent and student, and a good basic foundation in elementary school. In NYC they change the math curriculum every year it's no wonder they never learn it, they switch from abstract concept to abstract concept, meanwhile the kids don't know how to do basic math. One room schools did better at teaching basics with far less money.
katiemacny, I completely agree with you. My husband and I just toured Caraquet, N.B., Canada, and we saw an old one room school house. The guide said that former students (school closed in 1963) believed they learned a lot in their classes. First graders, who were expected to learn everything visually, absorbed info given to the older grades. These one room school students, who might have had illiterate parents, came out of 8th grade with so much knowledge, such an appreciation of learning... we must return to simpler schools!
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