Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy Judge-teacher job protection violates constitution

http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-teacher-protections-ruling-20140610-story.html
I am in California, in a high performing school district (API scores). I have moved my child to a private school - I pay for the PS (property tax and special school related taxes) and the private education for my child. Most of my problems with the schools in my district stem from the attitude of the teachers - especially towards gifted kids. I met teachers who were very well educated, tenured and "entrenched in the system" who were insensitive, unmotivated, unenergetic, full of excuses, lazy and struggling to do their jobs let alone differentiate based on a child's needs.
Many teachers who move on to 6 figure salaries and get pensioned off at that salary rate and have excellent health benefits, vacation time and perks and work for 10 months in a year have gotten used to having a comfortable lifestyle regardless of whether they perform or not.

I am so glad that someone with clout took it upon themselves to challenge a system that promotes "grossly ineffective" teachers (very true in my experience) and is fighting for placing children's interest in the forefront.

I'm in California. I could not agree more, and yes, we pay property tax on top of private school fees. The private schools aren't generally a LOT better in terms of teacher quality, but they stay in session longer and the school day is about an hour longer. This difference makes time for art, music, field trips, and all kind of other things that were typical of the public school I attended in the 1970s and 1980s.

The ironic thing is that I meet a lot of kids of public school teachers in the private schools ("I know what those schools are like! I work there!). Three of them have said this to me (and the private school has <100 kids). I really don't know what to make of that.

There is some ridiculous teacher behavior here and nothing is ever done. No one gets reprimanded, and there are never consequences for even the most outrageous behavior. If teachers here worked year-round like everyone else, their salary would be six figures. We are not in NYC or some other place with outrageous cost of living, it's pretty average. I got reprimanded at a job once because there was a rubber band on the floor and I didn't pick it up. If I had failed to reply to emails or phone calls or treated the customers rudely, I would have been gone in an instant. It's really frustrating that the standards that apply to everyone else don't seem to apply to teachers and it's the kids and families who have to pay. The kids only have one shot at an education, there are no do-overs. That being said, there are some really good teachers who clearly care about their jobs and spend extra hours and a lot of money out of their own pocket. Those teachers deserve a high salary but I wouldn't say that they make up a very high percentage.

That is a new one to me - it is indeed ironic that even the people working in CA public schools do not trust their schools to do right by their kids. Everyone seems to agree that public schools need to improve. They also agree that there are too many tenured teachers who are "chronically ineffective". The lawsuit was looking to highlight how toxic the unionization of tenured teachers was and instead they managed to convince the judge that children's rights were being violated.

Blackcat, if we were to write a job description of a typical tenured PS teacher in my school district, it would look like this - able to walk off the job at 3:45 pm, work for 9-10 months in a year, work in a high performing district where the parents ensure that their kids perform, get a 6 figure salary, retire and reap a pension based on the final salary in 6 figures, lobby union to allocate monster share of budget to pension fund and then ask parents for $$$ for classroom supplies, not be held responsible for slacking, "don't care" attitude to customers, lazy, constantly asking for free labor from parents, watching netflix movies with kids as a "treat", taking time off constantly, not having to teach on furlough days, not much going on during "early dismissal days" either, no need to differentiate instruction for gifted kids because there is no GATE program, write detailed notes to parents when unchallenged kids act out in frustration, write even more detailed notes in the progress report cards on how the bored kids behave, if all this is too tiring, then go back and take more vacation time off.

PS: my friend teaches 1st grade in an underprivileged community in Ventura county - she fights every day to bring learning and growth and a better life for the kids in her class whose first language is not english. She spends her time going to evening college to learn their language so that she can be a better teacher to them. She also pays for classroom supplies out of her pocket and goes in on weekends to set up her classroom projects and leads afterschool group activities etc. These teachers are exceptions. I hardly see any such teacher in my school district.

Sorry, I'm skeptical. Do they not grade papers, or plan lessons?

I asked one of my teacher friends about lesson plans. Her response, "They are pretty much given to me at this point. Plus, it isn't like a lot has changed about the Civil War from last year."

She is also a big fan of "Pass your paper to the person in front of you" style of grading of papers.

I'm sorry there are so many in CA that feel this way. I know in Iowa where I live, while a teacher can't be immediately dismissed unless it involves inappropriate contact with a student, there is a reasonable process to address ineffective teachers, the bigger problem is the vast majority of administration doesn't keep records, do reviews, or do any of the steps that process requires.

Most teachers do a good deal if not most of their planning, correspondence both written and verbal, grading, professional development, and reporting either before or after school hours. Few have any idea how much time is spent after school hours addressing school issues.

I'm not saying that the situation in CA is a good one or even reasonable, I'm simply saying that far too many across the country are far to quick to critically jump on teachers without having reasonable knowledge of what the position entails and how overwhelming the job can be. I think right now in our local school district, this is in Iowa mind you, about 50% of teachers choose not to continue in the career after the third year. That's pretty telling.

Being a classroom teacher is definitely not a job I would want to do. I imagine it can be very difficult, esp. with all the behavior issues and special needs students seen in classrooms. I think some people are cut out for it and others aren't. The ones who aren't either quit, or stick around and do their job grudgingly.

My kids had some teachers who were paid around $75k (elementary teachers). I strongly believe that the only reason they are sticking around is because they will take a substantial pay cut at any other job, and lose their pensions. Meanwhile the district is talking about RAISING salaries even more, claiming that they need to compete with surrounding districts and if they don't, the good teachers will leave or it will be impossible to attract anyone good. I don't really think I buy this. Are teachers really in that short supply? I would rather have a teacher who is still enthusiastic with 2 years experience who has the most recent training in methods (maybe gifted education!), than someone who is burnt out with 20 years experience, and higher demands for pay.

From my experience, I will seldom if ever want a "new" teacher instructing my children. They simply don't have yet what it takes to differentiate, they aren't flexible enough, they're not confident enough, and they simply don't have the library of experience it takes to deal effectively with a GT student. Perhaps others have different experiences with newer teachers, our track record though shows clearly this to be the case.

I am a teacher and now a school administrator in CA. I have spent 13 years in a non-union charter school. Our school is WASC accredited and a "distinguished" school, not a fly by night pop up charter.

We primarily hire new teachers. Our school does not purchase any boxed curriculum, nothing scripted or "pre-made". Each teacher makes their own curriculum and lessons- from deciding what books to teach, to collaborating in cross-subject projects, to writing their own math problems. If we hire new teachers, they come in fresh, passionate and inspired in their subject area and ready to change the world. We can teach them our way to teaching, classroom management and excitement. My teachers start at $34K and top out, with a masters degree and 20 years experience at $70K. I don't think that's an unreasonable pay scale- few careers ask you to work 20 years with a masters to be inching your way up to $70K.

My teachers teach 188 days a year. That means this summer, they have four weeks off to revamp their curriculum, attend a mandatory (unpaid) tech conference, take their personal vacations and go to the doctor. We don't have vacation days and sick days are limited to keep subs out of the classroom. Our middle and high school teachers have 140 student contacts a day. Our elementary have 28, with no aide and no daily prep.

We get some duds- sure! But the benefit of being non-union is that every employee is at-will so we don't have to wait forever to let someone go.

I wouldn't want a brand new one either, but one with a few years' experience would be Ok. My kids had a teacher who was brand new to the district with 3 years experience and she tried a lot harder to differentiate than the teachers with 20+ years, was better about responding to concerns, etc. The teachers with 20+ years have their lesson plans that they use every year and they seem to resent anyone asking for something different. That being said, I think the best teacher we have dealt with was more experienced, and she was not burnt out. But I don't think that the best teachers necessarily have the most experience, or inexperienced teachers don't have what it takes. I think the ones who just have a couple years under their belt are still trying hard, they have more enthusiasm, and they don't have tenure yet so they are trying not to screw things up.

My mom works as a teachers aide in Illinois and her district has assigned her to the worst teachers a.few times, because they know that she will not tolerate the teacher mistreating the children and she will report it. Then they can document a case to get rid of the teacher. It takes horrible, gross violations for a teacher to be dismissed.
Part of her job is to accept all the inneffective strategies and laziness of some of these teachers, no one wants to hear about that. But whenthey physically or verbally hurt the children, she ends up documenting it. It's awful. (Actually, teachers must freak out when my mom gets assigned to their classroom)

When my son was in school,his best teachers were actually brand new ones. I love those teachers and appreciate their dedication and honesty.
My mom, being assigned to the worst teachers in her district, has a whole different viewpoint.

No grading papers or lesson plans in our school district for K, 1st and 2nd grades (the students either meet or do not meet requirements based on "observation" in the classroom) - they have a common lesson plan for the whole grade which presumably was made by the "lead teacher" many years ago - nothing new happening to their meager spelling lists, hand puppet making kits and single digit addition work sheets - no frequent updating of documents needed on that front! (I pulled DS out of the system, so I don't know if things are different for late elementary grades).

As the topic says, underprivileged kids had to sue the state and teachers in order to try to get a good education and a judge had to state that the situation "shocked the conscience" for people to take notice. It should not have come down to this. And I live in the highest performing school district in the state - I am horrified at what the underprivileged kids who depend on the school system to make or break their futures go through.

I've read that teacher effectiveness rises for the first few years (say 3 to 5) but then plateaus. Some studies confirming this are cited at

http://winginstitute.org/Graphs/Staff/What-effect-does-experience-have-on-teacher-effectiveness/
What effect does experience have on teacher effectiveness?

http://tntp.org/ideas-and-innovations/view/teacher-experience-what-does-the-research-say
Teacher Experience: What Does the Research Say?

If there is no evidence that teachers with 20 years experience are better than those with 5, the two sets of teachers should be paid about the same. Current salary structures negotiated by unions heavily reward seniority.

Our experience is mixed: in my DD's school, the only teacher in three years who tried to help her was teaching for the first time. The two with 30+ years experience did nothing (one tried to hold her back in math), and the one who'd been teaching for 5-10 years held her back in math until October. She was finally forced to move her to the fastest math group when DD took a pretest on long division and got everything correct. The mix has been pretty much the same with my eldest son's teachers. I think that a lot depends on personal qualities in the teacher and the attitude of the administration. Overall, US schools tend to be anti-acceleration, and this outlook trickles down into the classroom.

As for the OP's lawsuit, the problem is more than just tenure. This lawsuit came up because the students (and presumably their parents) got fed up with the schools for failing to provide enough instruction time by people who were even minimally qualified to instruct. The schools in Oakland are an example of what I mean:



This has absolutely been the case with my son at our local high school. His math teacher was injured over Christmas, and the subs did their knitting and told the kids to teach themselves. There was effectively NO instruction for the rest of the year. I wrote three emails about the problem to the vice-principal; he never answered. Other parents told me about teachers taping their morning lectures and playing the tapes for afternoon classes. Etc. And this school is "highly rated." As a result, I can easily believe the claims about the lower-rated schools in Oakland.

I can, as well.

The level of this kind of shenanigans at the secondary level is now pretty much MIND-BOGGLING.


All of those with primary kids-- you really can't imagine. I couldn't have, that is for sure.

From a cost/benefit perspective, an employer also factors in churn rate, cost/time for interviewing new employees, absorbing the initial skill ramp up within an organization along with training and time impact on other employees (aka resources when one has this sort of discussion.) There was some number like 40% of teachers leave within the first five years and that number goes down over time.

So the slow pay ramp from five to twenty could be some sorta amortization of the hiring costs and initial risks.

Someone with a financial or actuarial background could probably make a better explanation than I.

I am beginning to realize this - atleast, my child in elementary school had teachers in the class all the time!

From these accounts and lawsuits, it seems that not all secondary school kids in California have teachers and appropriate classes to keep them engaged for the hours that they spend in school. The kid can as well go home and help out with chores to gain "inside work experience". What kind of an education system is that?

I can certainly see why there is a healthy market for expensive private schools in California.

Um-- I don't live in CA. It's everywhere.

There have (also) been legal actions re: instructional time in Texas and in Oregon this spring alone. Try just using the search terms "instructional hours" and "legal action" in google news, and you'll see what I mean.

I can also tell you that for every one of those lawsuits, there are HUNDREDS of cases where administration does all that they can to obfuscate the reality sufficiently that there is no traction for such a suit, in spite of the reality being absolutely egregious.

My daughter, as I've reported elsewhere at length, got seven-and-a-half hours of instruction this year in her SECOND YEAR foreign language course. Which has no textbook.

In math, the situation was not much better-- there, she got LESS instructional time than that, but at least had textbooks and parents who could help.

We wound up using family friends who are fluent as tutors for the foreign language course. It's a shame, as DD seems to have a real gift for learning vie immersion-- but she never really had a chance under these conditions, frankly.

California does have a parent trigger law - if a school is truly dreadful a majority of parents can more or less mount a hostile takeover, fire all the staff and start over.

It's a lot of work and if a school is merely mediocre parents probably won't push for the changes. But at least it's something.

Ending tenure protections will improve teacher quality only if principals use their power to terminate wisely. According to this essay they have done so when given the power

http://www.forbes.com/sites/modeledbehavior/2014/06/12/putting-teacher-tenure-in-context/
Putting Teacher Tenure In Context
by Adam Ozimek
Forbes
6/12/2014 @ 9:09AM