On May 10th, Rep. Mark Ferrandino, D-Denver, gave testimony to the House that included an accounting of his seventh grade experience with an insensitive teacher. I too have had poor teachers and we should do our utmost to make sure they exit our profession.
The problem with the Colorado Legislature’s recent passage of SB-191, which Ferrandino supported, is that it will do little to accomplish this while threatening to flatten the gains made by quality educators. Most of the teachers I know are professional, insightful, hard-working and creative people. In fact I have yet to meet a teacher who would make comments like the seventh grade teacher Ferrandino described. They exist, however, and SB-191 may snag some of them. But this bill will also take down some gifted instructors as well as those with great potential but in simple need of more experience and mentorship.
Instead of focusing on our worst experience, perhaps productive public discussion can spring from considering our best teachers. What is it that made them memorable? What was it about them that motivated us to learn – either then or years later?
Chances are we do not remember how well they drilled us on standardized test items. I also doubt we remember them for their great contributions to the churning of district paperwork or how they volunteered for committee positions or lunchroom duty so as to fall in the principal’s good graces. These are the factors that will determine “effective” teachers when they work under overtaxed administrators – administrators that by the very limit of the human time scale cannot possibly understand the nuances of “effective” instruction in each and every discipline.
Many administrators were at one time great teachers, but many were not. And even a great science teacher may not understand how to evaluate a foreign language instructor, a life skills specialist, or an AP calculus teacher.
Chances are the greatest teachers we have had, like our worst ones, left an impression for how they treated us, for how they held us accountable while always encouraging. It may be that those teachers lit up the class when leading discussions on civil rights, reenacting the Odyssey or celebrating the trends of data in a science lab. Or it may be that those teachers simply laughed at our jokes or shared an appreciation of jazz with us. It may have been that teacher’s extra help during lunchtimes or how that teacher could smile and maintain discipline simultaneously.
What all of our best teachers had in common was they were quality people (that is about as easy to define as “effective”), and they were enthusiastic. Their work relationships infused them with the drive to plunge into each new class with dynamism, with the eagerness to share a new method, explanation or insight. And those relationships are made possible in no small measure by the support and resource afforded teachers from their administrators, their school boards and indeed their state legislature.
It is these best teachers that we want to attract and retain. It is their attitudes that we want to cultivate in all teachers. Why then do we not discuss committing resources to teacher collaboration and mentorship programs that can do just that? Why are we not focused on developing the teacher, the learning environment and the culture needed to breed student success?
Sure we need to get rid of bad teachers. Let’s utilize the systems that are in place, tweak them where needed, and make that happen. But let’s not throw all of our resources into top-down, contrived and artificial measures of “effectiveness” that threaten to stamp out the good with the bad.
With SB-191’s passage, an enormous amount of time and money will be diverted from instruction to development of “effectiveness” metrics that appear to satisfy the law, but in reality do nothing to increase instructional quality.
SB-191 will spawn more mid-level management. Teachers and administrators will turn over especially in low socioeconomic communities where test scores are harder to improve, and some curriculum will be so watered down with quantifiable measures as to become chalk dust and paste. Why, in the face of decreasing budgets, would we create this enormous paperwork burden instead of pursuing meaningful reform?
Why not aim to bring experienced and new teachers together creating programs that engage and inspire their populations? Why not discuss reform in which all stakeholders, but especially teachers, good teachers, dedicated teachers, are included?
Without buy-in from all levels, any measure that is meant to improve classroom instruction is destined to failure. If our intent is to increase teacher and administrator turnover then SB-191 has merit.
If our intent is to actually improve the quality of classroom teachers and the instruction they deliver, then this bill promises to do much more harm than good.
John Rundell is a science teacher at Fairview High School. He lives in Boulder. EDITOR’S NOTE: This is an online-only column and has not been edited.
