By Tom
The Washington State legislature is currently dealing with a pair of bills designed to make it easier to fire bad teachers. The house version is apparently gaining traction. The senate version (SB 5399) is stalled, held up by Senator Rosemary McAuliffe, who chairs the leading education committee.
Good for you, Rosemary.
These bill are driven by the popular narrative that bad schools are caused by bad teachers, and bad teachers are nearly impossible to fire because of their powerful unions and because they have "tenure."
If that's true, then there should be data to support it, right?
But there isn't.
According to the National Center for Education Statistics, the average school district in 2007-2008 had 211.4 teachers. Of those 211.4 teachers, 4.4 of them were fired for poor performance. That's about two percent. I challenge you to find another profession with a higher termination rate.
But here's the weird thing: of those teachers who got fired, most of them were "protected by tenure." That's right; the average district fired 4.4 teachers. Three of them were tenured, and 1.4 of them weren't.
But isn't it impossible to fire tenured teachers? Apparently not. According to the standardized data, it seems easier than firing untenured teachers; 1.4 compared to 0.7. Twice as easy. And according to Perry Zirkel, professor of education and law at Lehigh University, when districts and teacher unions go to court to settle a termination issue, the districts win by a ratio of three to one. Not only is it possible to fire bad teachers who have tenure, but it happens quite often.
So on the one hand, we have the press and the president and Davis Guggenheim telling us that the problem with American education is bad teachers and their unwavering protection by the NEA and AFT.
And on the other hand, we have data that tells us differently. The data contradicts the popular narrative.
The irony, of course, is that so-called "education reformers" want more data used more often. They want the kids with bad data held back. They want the schools with bad data shut down. They want teachers of kids with good data paid more.
But more than anything, they want teachers of kids with bad data fired.
And they're frustrated by the fact that teachers and their unions disagree with them. So they perpetuate this myth that teachers are nearly impossible to fire.
Which simply isn't true.
And the last thing our state lawmakers should be doing right now is passing unnecessary legislation based on a myth.
So, being a math guy, I want to know what gives those of you who want to RIF on evaluation numbers such confidence in their veracity? I recently heard Scott Poirier of the W.E.A. quote an actual evaluation from New York: “We are 95% certain that this teacher is between the 46th and 84th percentile.”
The bill Senator Tom introduced said our evaluations would be rounded to the nearest hundredth. So you are O.K. with a 3.19 being RIF’ed before a 3.20? An average that may be based on whole numbers?
Have you even considered where the numbers you want to use are coming from?
There is more to this than your anecdotal experience about who you think are good and bad teachers.
The lynchpin: those who are doing the assessment of teacher performance must be given (1) adequate time, (2) adequate training…theoretically through a good admin/leadership program, and (3) adequate oversight in order for these evaluations to be timely, fair, and accurate.
But, if we had those three already, ineffective teachers would be removed in a more efficient way anyway.
I’ve waffled in my position so far, but I’ve decided I don’t disagree with the spirit of the bills in question–and I’ve decided (imo) last-in first-out is not necessarily best when it comes to RIFs. I think the change needs to come somewhere else…specifically in the roles, quality, and demands placed upon building or district administrators. Unfortunately, to do well and reliably what these bills call for (evaluation of teachers in a meaningful way, which I argue isn’t really happening everywhere), I almost wonder if we’d need more administrators, further ballooning a rank which many see as a prime location of fiscal waste and a perfect place to make cuts. If administrators presently had the time, training, and capacity to observe teachers regularly and have the difficult conversations with the underperformers (due process), we would not be feeling such a need for this kind of legislation. I really think that effective evaluation of teachers (as well as remediation when necessary) is darn close to a full time job if done well… in my building, each admin oversees +/- 29 teachers as well as some classified staff. Twenty-nine meaningful observations is more than just 29 two-minute walk-throughs of a teacher’s classroom. (On the flip side, I think admin ought to have the right to do unannounced observations at will, which is prohibited in many local CBAs which require forewarning that might lead the teacher to “put on a good show” rather than be “caught in the act.”)
Maybe we need a roving band of trained instructional observers (akin to the mythical DeathSquads once attributed to Obamacare) which roam the countryside observing and expelling ineffective teachers. I’m really only half joking on that one…
It is really good to have this debate. It is hard for me, though, to imagine that this is anything BUT student achievement vs. jobs. Pitting teachers against each other within a building is potentially unfortunate, but MASSIVELY less unfortunate than having a substandard teacher in front of kids. The research agrees. The final line from the report on Washington by CALDER on the current system is:
“This is sensible for while the simplicity and transparency of a seniority-based system certainly has advantages, it is hard to argue that it is a system in the best interest of student achievement.”
We should not ever compromise student achievement; it is the driver of the work, and in the end, what matters most.
The money quote from Kristin’s link:
“those who rail against seniority-based policies – using oversimplified characterizations such as “last in, first out” – sometimes appear rather out of touch with the reality of how these policies actually work, and how much they vary by location. The public (and perhaps some policymakers as well) may not be aware of these details, and we should be clear about the current situation before deciding whether and how to change it.”
Before abandoning the current system (which isn’t perfect) let’s make sure we have something better.
SB 5399 isn’t.
Where did I say anything about “regardless of your worth”?
A teacher’s first years tend to have the steepest gains in terms of student progress. Thus, last-in-first-out makes an awful lot of sense.
Are there exceptions? Sure! But that’s what honest evaluations and due process are for. And if you’re dealing with an administration that can’t handle due process, why would you want to give that administration more power?
Rob D. shared this article from the Huffington Post on an earlier post of mine, and I think it’s only fair to contribute it to this discussion.
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/answer-sheet/guest-bloggers/eliminating-seniority-based-la.html?wprss=answer-sheet
Worth taking into account.
Ooops – I meant Separate, with an a. I always struggle with that one.
Clix – I assume you’re being sarcastic at the end of your comment, though that doesn’t always translate well in print.
You’re right – one would be loyal to an organization that promised to retain you regardless of your worth if you only stuck around. I’d be awfully loyal, too, because it would mean that as long as I showed up every year, I had a guaranteed job when times got tough.
But we don’t have jobs that involve simply being there. We have jobs that require energy and skill.
I agree with Tom that these bills can be seen as the legislature doing the dirty work during RIFs. At the same time, I think their real worth is that good teachers are protected during RIFs. When I get excited that RIFs might mean poor teachers are let go, that’s because I would get excited if anything meant those people left the profession – a move to Tibet, retirement, winning the lottery – get them out and I’m happy.
But when I look at the teachers I work with who are new to the profession, like the 45-year old guy down the hall who has been RIF’d and rehired three times now and who is excellent (and getting a little fed up and thinking about doing something else), I see this bill as trying to protect his contribution to the system as well as reward his effort and fight for his loyalty. And I’d rather reward him, and get his loyalty and longevity, than my unskilled and careless colleague who is waiting for retirement.
And that scenario reveals a problem area in terms of 5399 and 1609 – up until recently, all the bad teachers in my building received satisfactory evaluations – which would make these bills useless. However, I think there is a lot of work being done on training principals to evaluate effectively as well as expectations being placed on them to move out teachers who are not performing. I think that this, happening in conjunction with a better riffing procedure, will make a big difference in the quality of public education.
Should my principal have fired that teacher long ago? Yes. You’re absolutely right. But, these bills are a seperate conversation in that they are about riffing procedure – who gets cut when there’s not enough money for everyone? All I’m saying is that I think there’s a better way to do it than to fire the newest. And who’s to say that if RIFs are based on performance, a lot of new teachers wouldn’t also go?
Dr. Pezz – I don’t know exactly what changes will be made regarding no evaluation – but I know my story made him realize that that’s not a good stipulation and I’m assuming teachers who don’t have evaluations because their administrators aren’t in compliance will not be put a the head of the RIF line.
==Tom, you may be right that other professions use last in first out, but isn’t it based on the assumption that employees are interchangeable?==
It’s more likely that other professions recognize that experience and commitment actually matter. What kind of loyalty would you have for an organization that ignored it when budgets were tight? Is a revolving door for teachers what’s best for students?
When you’ve got a teacher who’s been put on a plan of improvement, how much simpler would it be to say, “uhoh! money’s tight! guess we don’t have to bother with you!”
And instead of laying off new staff, whose salaries are lower, wouldn’t it make ever so much more sense to cut senior staff, who have expensive salary and benefits package?
Yes! Why would anyone NOT support this legislation? It is the simple, sensible thing to do.
Chris-
Thanks for the comment, and welcome to the blog. I understand that the supporters of this bill have in mind the best interests of students. And I appreciate that.
On the other hand, that doesn’t mean that the opponents don’t. It’s not teachers vs. students.
My point is this: we already have language in every contract that provides a means by which a principal can dismiss a poor teacher. And as I point out in the post, it’s being used, far more often than most people are aware.
This bill is flawed. The math is bogus, the section about incomplete evaluations doesn’t make any sense, and it threatens to make teachers compete with one another.
But the worst thing about it is the fact that it’s unnecessary, and it allows principals to let the legislature do the “dirty work” of firing underperforming teachers.
Let’s continue to debate this, Chris, but please refrain from labeling the two sides “for kids” and “for adults.” That just isn’t fair
Thanks for the post, Tom. This is a bill eminently worth discussing, and as a teacher and new reader of this blog, it is interesting to me that accomplished teachers are against the spirit of this bill. Kristin’s point that the bill isn’t perfect is true, and we shouldn’t forget that it may still be amended if it is granted a hearing. Senator Tom (one of the bill’s sponsors in the Senate) is actively seeking amendments to make it as solid as it can be.
The fundamental question that must be answered is: Is this bill good for kids? If the goal is to retain the best teachers for kids, then the answer is ‘yes’. It seems to me that any other vote is one in favor of protecting the jobs of teachers that aren’t doing as well. The argument that this will pit one teacher against another is also irrelevant when it comes to considering what is best for kids. Is the effect of having one teacher dislike another for petty reasons going to hamper a student’s education more than a year of a struggling teacher?
This profession is about kids, not adults.
Great post, Tom! I hope you’re finding allies who are helping you to point out the obvious here.
I agree, Tom. The law shouldn’t be trial and error.
(Sorry for the pun. I couldn’t help myself, but it does sum up my feelings quite well.)
Good idea, Pezz. This thing looks half-baked at best. It’s a “working document” the way my son’s math homework tonight was a “working document.” It was all wrong until I went over it with him and made him do it again. Correctly.
Will he take it off the table until the evaluation pilot concludes its work?
Dr. Pezz, that’s the language that was most unacceptable to me, so I emailed Senator Tom and told him my situation.
He forwarded my email to the bill’s creator and asked that it be revised, and he emailed me back within a few hours to say it would be changed.
See? It is a working document.
From the bill:
“…any certificated classroom teacher for whom no evaluation data is available must have his or her employment contract nonrenewed before any other certificated classroom teacher within his or her certification or endorsement area.”
Scary. What happens if the employee wasn’t evaluated?
“not applicable to ‘provisional employees'”
Ironic. Aren’t these the very teachers the bill is aiming to protect (those young and “inspired” teachers)?
Dr Pezz, it’s still based on category. Just as with the current riffing procedure, some elementary teachers would go, some LA teachers, some math, some science, and so on. If all the highest scoring teachers were in P.E., it wouldn’t mean that more history teachers were RIF’d.
I’m also concerned about the reliability of administrator evaluations, since I STILL have yet to have my administrator find my paperwork or complete my evaluation. Now she says we have to redo it. Even so, I think we need to take steps toward something better than last in first out.
For one thing, like teachers, principals are starting to be expected to meet pretty tough standards. I think they will get better at what they do because they will have to. I’m okay moving forward with a performance-based riffing procedure because I’m anticipating that administrators will be motivated to do a better job. Many administrators are already doing a fantastic job.
Tom, you may be right that other professions use last in first out, but isn’t it based on the assumption that employees are interchangeable? That there’s no increased return from having the best employees? And are teachers so interchangeable that riffing based on years in service is the best possible option?
One of the things that I see as an obstacle to public education really working well is that educators tend to say, “that won’t work until…” Our students won’t reach standard until mom and dad value education. Our students won’t learn until we have fewer kids in each class. Our drop out rate won’t improve until families start to expect kids to graduate. There are a lot of excuses.
Are 5399 and 1609 perfect? No. But they’re a start. I’m glad someone got the ball rolling, put the idea out there, and is willing to draft a better system for riffing than the one we have, where a teacher’s worth is completely ignored. I think a teacher’s worth is measureable, recordable, and that good teachers deserve to have their jobs protected before those teachers who aren’t cutting it.
DrPezz takes it back to the questions I asked on the original post about this: Would this bill be necessary if administrators had the time/skills to evaluate teachers in the first place? What in this bill ensures that administrators will have the time to actually do after the bill what they should have been doing before the bill?
(Despite how those questions might be misread, I actually am still on the fence on this bill… I see some pros and cons, but the answers to those two questions are critical to my decision about whether to support the bill.)
Two more thoughts I had:
What happens if the best teachers (rather than the most senior) are in the same department? What if those to be let go (riffed) are all in the math department? How does this get rectified when you now have people not qualified to teach those math classes? Who gets stuck in those math classrooms?
Why would we elevate a principal to a position above everyone else? If principals can block a teacher’s entrance into a school, then do they not essentially now have the most power in the district (even above the human resources director and other district office personnel)? Would this not allow a principal to determine who gets to keep a job and who doesn’t without an evaluation really being involved?
If we let legislators micromanage the profession, we’re in deep, deep trouble.
The only arguments for this bill seem to be examples of exceptions to the rule. Data doesn’t support the bill, a change in the evaluation system is already underway (making this bill moot), and this bill should actually make young teachers wary.
The perpetuation of the “bad teacher impossible to fire” myth is a straw man argument. The logic is poor and the evidence is not supporting it.
What the state might actually need is some way to force administrators to do their jobs. If they do, this issue doesn’t exist and the straw man argument dies.
I still contend that these bills would protect good teachers during a reduction in force. And I’m always candid. It’s often a curse.
As for my previous statement about it allowing Seattle to get rid of teachers who have unsatisfactory evaluations should we (and we will) have RIFs, well, that’s true, too, and is based on my strong emotions about our recent RIFs, where bad teachers were kept and good teachers laid off.
I think whether these bills help eliminate bad teachers or help protect good teachers depends on the particular teacher you have in mind. Mark’s thinking of two new, good teachers whose jobs are at risk if there’s a reduction in force. I’m also thinking of new teachers who probably won’t be teaching next year if we have RIFs. At the same time, I’m thinking of the teachers in my building who are on plans of improvement that are a loooooooooooooonnnnnnnnnnnnngggggggggg time coming, and I’m thinking that if RIFs were based on performance, they wouldn’t be here next year and public education in Seattle would instantly improve.
You misread, Jason; missing this line: “According to the standardized data, it seems easier than firing untenured teachers; 1.4 compared to 0.7.”
The key word is “standardized.” If you follow the link you can read Zirkel’s original quote. Standardization, as I understand it, takes into account overall numbers.
I’m not stupid. I know that most teachers have tenure, which is why I quoted Zirkel correctly.
And I didn’t say 2% of teachers got “laid off.” Two percent were fired. There’s a difference. Let me repeat my original challenge: find another profession that fires 2% of its workforce annually.
And one more thing: please don’t swear on our blog. It’s entirely possible, and far preferable, to engage in rich discourse without using foul language.
That’s an extremely misleading way to present data. The fact that 3/4 teachers laid off have tenure may very well just represent thefactthat a greater proportion of teachers have tenure. This is only unexpectedly high if say, 1/2 of teachers have tenure. On the other hand if 10% of teachers don’t have tenure, then they make up a disproportionate number of those fired.
More context is needed to make any claim about that data. 2% layoffs are pretty damn low in the context of this economy, FWIW. Not taking sides here just saying the picture is not Lear or obvious from what you’re citing.
Kristin:
With all due respect (and I sincerely mean that) how can you possible state that you “disagree that these bills are an attempt to get rid of bad teachers” and then go on to talk about how these bills would help your district get rid of bad teachers?
Stating that they’re designed to “protect good teachers” doesn’t cut it.
If we’re going to debate these bills, let’s at least be candid.
As I see it, there are two issues: Reduction in Force (RiF) and Termination. Riffing is used when enrollment drops or staffing ratios change. Currently, most districts have a collective bargaining agreement that addresses riffing with a last in-first out procedure. The benefits of such a policy are to provide job security for teachers and (hopefully) to attract competent people to the teaching profession.
Education is not the only industry to employ such a policy. Engineers, stevedores, bricklayers and nurses have the same system. (And I strongly suspect that book-sellers do, as well.)
Termination, on the other hand, is used to get rid of employees who under-perform. As I point out in my post, education has a robust and well-used system for terminating bad teachers; and so-called “tenure” shouldn’t – and doesn’t – prevent competent principals from using this system.
As for tweaking these bills? I’m not at all interested in that. I see these bills for what they are and I’ve contacted my lawmakers to let them know what I think of them. I want these bills to either die in committee or die on floor.
And I want principals who have poorly-performing teachers to grow a spine, earn their salaries, and get rid of them.
I’m sorry you’ve got a bad teacher in your school. And I’m even sorrier that your principal won’t deal with it.
Very interesting! I knew that “tenure” or seniority did not make a teacher bulletproof, but the data you share is compelling and gives me some perspective.
I agree that this is a very worthwhile rebuttal to those who claim that the unions “protect bad teachers” and only care about tenure…but I still believe that there is a case for a different system of RIFing as Kristin advocates (whether the current bill is the answer, I don’t know yet…still trying to learn and make up my mind). When I consider who is at the bottom of the heap in our district, I see (in particular) two very effective and promising young teachers. And as I scan the staff meetings, I easily see two less-effective staff members who administrative turnover (or lack of administrative time/initiative) have prevented from being on plans of improvement, even though they should be the ones to go.
I mean “layoff,” not “lay off.”
Maybe it was a subconscious way to tell you to “lay off” the ed reformers – I am one.
Tom, the bills are not about firing teachers whose students have poor data. They are trying to change our current riffing system – which rifs based on seniority and not performance.
Where else does this happen? Even at my local bookstore, if they have to downsize they first downsize those they can do without. Why do we allow good teachers to be laid off?
I disagree that these bills are an attempt to get rid of bad teachers. You’re right, principals have the ability to fire bad teachers, and many of them take advantage of it.
5399 and 1609 are about protecting good teachers during lay offs. As someone who’s seen great teachers laid off, I’m for trying to make this work. 5399 and 1609 are living documents right now, and open for debate. If there’s something about them you don’t like, then email your congressman or woman and try to tweak the language.
The other important component of 5399 and 1609 is the mutual agreement between a displaced teacher and the building’s principal. I know principals who were assigned a displaced teacher and it was not a mutually agreeable situation.
Last year, we received a displaced teacher who didn’t want to return to the classroom from the central office, so she used sick leave for a full year to get to retirement and we had a sub. This situation wasn’t fair to the sub or the kids. The sub could have been hired if the position had opened up, but it wasn’t open because the displaced teacher claimed the right to that contract – even though she refused to teach. This is a broken system.
Sometimes it takes awhile to gather the evidence to fire a bad teacher. It can take more than a year. A teacher who has had unsatisfactory evaluations, who is on a plan of improvement, who is someone a principal is trying to fire, is still protected by seniority during a rif and someone who is really valuable to the building is laid off. This is a broken system.
I think we need to have a conversation about what these bills are trying to do, and maybe find a way to revise them so that they work, rather than just shutting them down because they’re the work of “so called education reformers.” That kind of attack squashes the ability to find a meaningful compromise.
The fact is, we use last in first out because no one can design a better system. I think Pettigrew and Tom have tried, and now it’s time for us to add our expertise and help design a better riffing protocol. If we say, “Ooooh, it smells like ed reform – I’m against it,” we’re never going to develop a better way to lay teachers off than the one we have. And the one we have is doing more harm than good.
Thank you so much for collecting all of this 😀