Yet Again

I read with great distress, the recent brainstorm that the Gates Foundation is evidently backing: using digital video to improve what conventional wisdom uses to blame failures of our educational system: evaluating teachers.

I must say I was amused. Years ago, when video tape cameras became cheap enough for school districts to use them, some administrators got the bright idea to video tape classes. Of course, the cameras were large and bulky, made noise, and were distracting. That was only the first problem.

There were a lot of problems. One obvious one was that the camera was one dimensional. The sound was usually awful, because the classroom did not have multiple microphones. And, the scope of the camera was very limited. So what you got was a picture of the teacher all the time, barely in focus, with rapid blurry shifts from the teacher to whoever answered a question. This lasted for a few minutes, and then all you got was a steady shot of the teacher, the teacher, the teacher. You saw no student reaction or on task behavior at all.

I am sure the new digital equipment will be more adaptable. But, who will run the camera? If it is not an experienced teacher/administrator then forget it. Just as the person who runs the camera determines the accuracy of the picture (and quality for that matter) the cameraman is essential when using video to improve instruction. So, you will have to pay someone to run the camera who knows what they are doing.

“Knows what they are doing”, is the operative phrase here.

The entire thing is knowing what you are doing. I am listening to Michelle Rhee, who just said tenure and the teacher’s unions are the problem of education. She was recently responsible for her boss getting fired; he lost re-election, in Washington D.C., because she ran the schools not knowing what she was doing. She admits she did not build consensus, did not relate to teachers, did not relate to parents, but she closed a bunch of schools, and improved a few others. And she got her mayor fired by turning the system upside down. She didn't have a clue. Now, she is an expert of school reform? What?

Why tenure? Just go to one school board meeting anywhere. The United States’ educational system is failing because of the local school board system. We put people in charge of the schools who don’t know what they are doing. Then we worry that the system is not working.

What other profession on earth has lay people running them? Would Doctors allow lay people on their regulatory boards? Would lawyers let shop keepers on their bar committees; of course not! But, educators at the K-12 level, even Charter Schools, are governed by “the people”, who don’t know anything about education; who resent educators, who have hidden agendas, and sometimes are not honest.

School boards have political and personal agendas. Teachers were fired before tenure, for their political views, if they got married, if they were seen having a beer on a Saturday; all sorts of nonsense. There were women who were fired because they got pregnant scarcely thirty years ago!

That is why you have tenure, for professional protection from unprofessional school boards.

Our local elementary school district was just ripped apart by a Board President whose wife was stealing money from the school she worked at as a library aide. He was able to hide the crime, and threatened the Superintendent, who hesitated to do anything since he had the votes to get her fired. When the crime was finally exposed, by the Principal of the school, who was almost fired for her courage, the Superintendent quit, the Board President quit, the Board is left with a mess, and the children suffer. The credibility of the Board and the Superintendent was destroyed. How does this mess lead educational reform?

This kind of nonsense happens all the time. Local school boards have meetings with hundreds of furious parents, because the board has decided to do something that is completely nuts! Read any local newspaper for a short time and you will find school board malfeasance all over the place! Superintendents, highly educated and highly paid, spend 90% of their time “babysitting” school boards, dealing with irrational behavior and worse by board members. Capable leaders are fired all the time, because they take on school board tyrants, only the Superintendents who can “get along” with wacko board members survive. How do I know this, because I was one!

If you stand up for rational behavior, you risk being fired.

Our educational system does not work because of the fundamental flaw in its governance. We need to do away with local school boards, and install professional Boards, organized regionally, that enforce national learning standards and goals. And, this needs to be federalized. States have no reason to be running schools. Check out China, I will bet their system is nationalized, as is most of the developed world!

We need to professionalize our school system from top to bottom. If this is done, the need to unionize will decline rapidly. And, we will see a viable and effective evaluation system because professionals will be running the system.

So, put away your video cameras Mr. Gates, and start pushing for more fundamental reform; change the governance system, centralize it and streamline it.

We spend so much on education without much pay off, because we have a labyrinth of governance that discourages effective reform. Until we make that fundamental governance reform, we are wasting a whole lot of money to accomplish nothing.

It’s the system stupid!