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Chicago Teachers Strike 2012

What would the feds do if the school district just declared itself bankrupt, filed bankruptcy and shut down all the schools indefinitely? What happens if a school district just declared it doesn't have the $$$ anymore and shut itself down? Would the feds step in? State government? Maybe Chicago could enter into a contract with China to provide education to the kids. Government sells tollways. Why not sell school systems?
 
Saw this on CNN. I love the quote from the teachers unions:

"This is no way to measure the effectiveness of an educator,"

Then fire every ****ing one of them and replace them with people who believe that there are ways to measure the effectiveness of different educators. (i.e people who are not lying and/or stupid).
 
When I was very active in the union and the Chair of all the high school representing nearly 2,000 members - we constantly pushed for such action only to be told we must limit ourselves to wages, benefits, hours and working conditions for teachers. Everything else was the province of the administration and we were simply told which field we must pick the cotton in.

:rofl -- Betcher' glad you picked that field! Right now, the union is negotiating for air conditioning in every classroom. I'm quite sure their purvue is fairly broad.
 
:rofl -- Betcher' glad you picked that field! Right now, the union is negotiating for air conditioning in every classroom. I'm quite sure their purvue is fairly broad.

Except for gym, auto shop and a few other possibilities where there are problems with enclosing, that may be the most reasonable demand they are making if they don't already have it. OMG it gets drenching humid in Chicago in summers.
 
Hmmmm so why doesn't the Board of Education and The CTU come up with an Effective means of teaching kids and Implement More Vocational Education

I would love to see more vocational education implemented!
 
That "horrible evaluation system" has been around for forty years. CPS and teachers collaborated on a new system...the teachers' union is fighting it's "trial implementation" where this year's results would only impact non-tenured teachers and be advisory to tenured ones.

I'm not sure what system that has been around for forty years that you are talking about. Let me tell you about the merit system that is going to be implemented, from what I know. First of all, teachers are going to grade their own tests. That seems extra stupid to me. Second, I gave the pretest for two classes. In my algebra classes, my students were able to do some of the problems, and do decently well it seemed. The geometry test, however, was full of questions you could only answer if you had taken one year of geometry. There was one question maybe my students could answer. Now, I am required to choose one class period and grade their tests. Guess what class I'm going to choose? My geometry class is going to start with a grade of basically zero, and after I teach them for a year many of them will do much better on the post test. I'm going to look look awesome.

So at any school all of the geometry teachers are gonna look great almost no matter what, while the algebra teachers, or the algebra II teachers might look worse. It won't mean the geometry teachers are better, its just that the tests are skewed that way.

This is just one example of how the merit based pay system is messed up. I personally am not against merit pay in and of itself, and neither are my colleagues. However, the devil is in the details. How EXACTLY are teachers going to be judged? At my old school I had many students who would miss one or two classes a week. Am I going to be responsible for my students growth if they don't even make it to class 75% of the time? The number of potential problems is ENORMOUS.
 
Saw this on CNN. I love the quote from the teachers unions:



Then fire every ****ing one of them and replace them with people who believe that there are ways to measure the effectiveness of different educators. (i.e people who are not lying and/or stupid).

Do you really think that firing and replacing all of the current teachers would lead to improvement in student achievement?
 
Do you really think that firing and replacing all of the current teachers would lead to improvement in student achievement?
Long-term, sure. Private markets do this day in day out, and it improves overall market performance.
 
I'm not sure what system that has been around for forty years that you are talking about. Let me tell you about the merit system that is going to be implemented, from what I know. First of all, teachers are going to grade their own tests. That seems extra stupid to me. Second, I gave the pretest for two classes. In my algebra classes, my students were able to do some of the problems, and do decently well it seemed. The geometry test, however, was full of questions you could only answer if you had taken one year of geometry. There was one question maybe my students could answer. Now, I am required to choose one class period and grade their tests. Guess what class I'm going to choose? My geometry class is going to start with a grade of basically zero, and after I teach them for a year many of them will do much better on the post test. I'm going to look look awesome.

So at any school all of the geometry teachers are gonna look great almost no matter what, while the algebra teachers, or the algebra II teachers might look worse. It won't mean the geometry teachers are better, its just that the tests are skewed that way.

The only thing you're missing here is that the committee that put the evaluation together was representative of both sides of the table. They agreed on an evaluation. And now CTU is sitting tight about agreeing to it...on a trial basis. Now. Tell me what sense that makes?

Rahm Emanuel said there is some system of teacher evaluation in place right now -- totally ineffective -- that's been in place for forty years. If you know something different, post your link.

This is just one example of how the merit based pay system is messed up. I personally am not against merit pay in and of itself, and neither are my colleagues. However, the devil is in the details. How EXACTLY are teachers going to be judged? At my old school I had many students who would miss one or two classes a week. Am I going to be responsible for my students growth if they don't even make it to class 75% of the time? The number of potential problems is ENORMOUS.

Pleas post a link on the current (and no longer on the table, btw) merit pay system discussed by the union and CPS. If you have facts, please post them. If you have heresay, you're pickin' up what the union is puttin' down.

PS -- BTW, I completely agree with you about vocational classes. That kind of thing, imo, is what the teacher's union should be clamoring about. Not art. Not music. ​Vocational Classes!! A program to help these kids, you know, actually earn a living.
 
Under their current contract, Chicago teachers earn a minimum of $47,268...if they have less than a year of experience and a bachelor's degree. Plus they get generous benefits and they don't work summers. They're hardly underpaid. They should cut the crap about this being all about the students, when it is clearly all about the teachers. It drives me nuts when highly-educated, upper-middle-class, mostly white teachers advocate for things that actively harm poor, mostly minority students...and then have the audacity as try to frame it as standing up for the little guy.
 
The only thing you're missing here is that the committee that put the evaluation together was representative of both sides of the table. They agreed on an evaluation. And now CTU is sitting tight about agreeing to it...on a trial basis. Now. Tell me what sense that makes?

Rahm Emanuel said there is some system of teacher evaluation in place right now -- totally ineffective -- that's been in place for forty years. If you know something different, post your link.



Pleas post a link on the current (and no longer on the table, btw) merit pay system discussed by the union and CPS. If you have facts, please post them. If you have heresay, you're pickin' up what the union is puttin' down.

PS -- BTW, I completely agree with you about vocational classes. That kind of thing, imo, is what the teacher's union should be clamoring about. Not art. Not music. ​Vocational Classes!! A program to help these kids, you know, actually earn a living.

I'm kinda of wondering why CTU has this much say on how they are evaluated. That seems to be the biggest part of the problem. I say the people that pay you get the final say on how to evaluate you.
 
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The Chicago Public School System is famous as having the shortest school day of any city in the United States. Just 5-1/2 hours. Emanuel was right to go after a longer day, but probably not very well timed.

The average teacher in CPS earns just over $71.000. (I actually don't believe this number; I think it's much higher; but that's the number that's out there.) Starting salary for a CPS teacher is $50,577. In addition to their "Step & Lane Increases" of approximately 3.5% annually, the CPS offer calls for a 3% wage increase in Year One, and a 2% increase in Years Two thru Four of their four-year contract. The new contract will increase teachers' pay by at least 16% over the course of those 4 years. (I think that's not right, but that's the number Emanuel used. I think the number is higher.)

They only have to teach for 5 1/2 hours a day, even with an hour and a half planning time, that doesn't bring them to a full 40 hour work week.
In addition the average pay is greater than the median income of the average tax payer, with generous pension system and a very low cost med plan.

It's completely ridiculous that they are on strike.
 
Long-term, sure. Private markets do this day in day out, and it improves overall market performance.

Totally agree, teachers unions have destroyed our school system, they are not about teaching kids they are all in it for themselves. They want the highest pay and benefits they can squeeze out of the legislators in the name of "we teach your kids" and if you give us this raise you get my vote. And believer me I'll be back next year to squeeze you all over again, money for my vote. Fire them.
 
Totally agree, teachers unions have destroyed our school system, they are not about teaching kids they are all in it for themselves. They want the highest pay and benefits they can squeeze out of the legislators in the name of "we teach your kids" and if you give us this raise you get my vote. And believer me I'll be back next year to squeeze you all over again, money for my vote. Fire them.

I know right? OMG, everyone fired, that can't be good for the kids? Oh wait, it is. Death is a natural part of life. Got to let the school system experience some death to allow it to enjoy the spring that life can offer.
 
What's your point?

I thought that was clear. No matter where the kid goes, its still the same kid operating years behind with the same skill levels. Changing the building where he goes does nothing to change that reality.
 
What's missing is the ability of the parents to cancel their contract with that crappy school and shop for a school that can do a better job of educating their kid.

I guess you don't have kids.
 
I thought that was clear. No matter where the kid goes, its still the same kid operating years behind with the same skill levels. Changing the building where he goes does nothing to change that reality.

I think the evidence has shown that teachers have a marginal impact over how a student performs.
With that said, why should the teachers get such excellent pay and benefits, with all those other perks, including dedicated raises, when it has virtually no impact on the quality of education delivered?
 
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On Monday morning, 350,000 kids in Chicago found themselves without a classroom to bustle about as the city's teachers went on their first strike in 25 years. The sticking point? A new teacher evaluation system.

While Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel and the local teachers' union disagree on a long list of issues, including planned pay raises and sick day accrual, Emanuel said in a press conference Monday afternoon that the evaluation is the main obstacle to agreement. The new system would eventually use students' standardized test scores as 40 percent of a teacher's yearly evaluation. Teachers who don't improve their students' test scores would be fired.

Many Democrats, including Emanuel's former boss President Barack Obama, embrace this test-based way of judging educators. The president's "Race to the Top" federal program awarded money to states that agreed to rate teachers this way and institute other reforms, like encouraging the creation of more independent charter schools. As of last October, teachers can be dismissed in 14 states based on their students' test scores.

Union supporters argue that evaluating teachers using tests can be tricky, and that this "value-added" measurement can be volatile and inaccurate. Additionally, teachers who have a high proportion of poor students may have a harder time lifting their kids' scores than teachers who work in affluent districts. (About 80 percent of Chicago students qualify for free or reduced federal lunches.) As many as 6,000 teachers would wrongly lose their jobs under the system, says Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) President Karen Lewis. "Evaluate us on what we do, not the lives of our children we do not control," she said while announcing the strike, according to Reuters. But reformers counter that teachers should be responsible for helping their students score better on tests, and that current evaluation systems provide no way for ineffective teachers to be identified or removed from classrooms.

Emanuel doubled down on the new evaluation system Monday, as negotiations between CTU and the city dragged on. "What we can't do is roll back what's essential to improving our quality of education," Emanuel said at the press conference, flanked by children. He called the strike "totally unnecessary."
While other city and state leaders have pioneered test-based evaluations without prompting strikes, one sticking point that may make Emanuel's reforms more controversial is a lack of money. The school district is facing a $3 billion deficit over the next few years. Former Washington, D.C., Schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee was able to overhaul the city's teacher compensation and evaluation system in part by offering big pay increases for teachers who thrived under the new system. But Emanuel has no such leverage.....snip~

The ABCs of the Chicago teachers
The Lookout – 2 hrs 29 mins ago..<<<<< More here Way More!

Seems.....I called it earlier with the Evaluations being the MAIN Sticking Point. Course the Counter Argument is that the teachers only see that 40% of the Evaluation is to be cosnidered on test scores. Which leaves the Other 60% for the Teachers and the Administration to work on those aspects within the margin.
 
I do and if that school were to take my money and not deliver services I've paid for, I'd take them to court for fraud.

Public schools are free. So, good luck with that.
 
I think the evidence has shown that teachers have a marginal impact over how a student performs.
With that said, why should the teachers get such excellent pay and benefits, with all those other perks, including dedicated raises, when it has virtually no impact on the quality of education delivered?

I would be happy to look at your evidence for this claim. Please do provide it.
 
They are not free.
It just so happens that I got my property tax statement a couple of days ago.

Looks like I pay property taxes for schools.

Please

char/10
Your credibility is slipping away
 
I would be happy to look at your evidence for this claim. Please do provide it.

Well see, if you think teacher quality is a huge factor in student achievement, then Chicago pub school teachers have a lot of explaining to do.
Either way, they're hosed.

What are the Chicago tax payers getting for their investment.
The stats show, not a whole lot.
 
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