A couple weeks ago the JPEF advocated for schools to get VAM
scores like teachers do.
Well friends even though the Times Union would have you
believe VAM scores needed to be released so people can see for themselves how
bad they are, people have known how bad they are and would be almost as soon as
the state came up with the idea to use them.
VAM scores over the last week has made Florida’s education system
laughing stock of the country and the JPEFs major poicy suggestion to improve things it to use VAM
scores to grade schools. The JPEF,
little more than a mouthpiece for Gary Chartrand and his horrible ideas, should
stick to what they are good at and it is not policy.
I have seen quality math teachers treated as though they had no value just because they did not teach the levels of math required for school grades and consequently, the Principal's evaluation and pay raise. At First Coast High School, one such teacher had a Masters in Math, another had a Bachelors in Math with a minor in Physics, another had a Bachelors in Math with a minor in Statistics, another had a Bachelors in Statistics with a minor in Math, and yet another had an Engineering degree. All these people are capable of teaching all levels of high school math but were never valued because they did not teach the courses that mattered. I am aware that at least 4 of them are out of teaching for good because of First Coast High School. The Principal had his Bachelors in English and a Masters in educational leadership. First Coast High School is a place that has no standards.
ReplyDeleteBecause its the actual passing of a few state-mandated courses that matter for graduation purposes and for the principal's credibility, brilliant teachers of mathematics, statistics, physics, and chemistry, are regarded very lowly by school administrations in Inner City Schools. As a consequence, the teaching careers of many very smart math teachers end prematurely because of these NUTTY PRINCIPALS. Got the MESSAGE - Principals in URBAN SCHOOLS are destroying the careers of many Bright Professionals!
Incidentally, of all the current principals in Jacksonville Inner City Schools you may hardly find a single one having one of these 'power degrees' mentioned. Many of these administrators seem to have English degrees together with quite an amount of disrespect for math and physics teachers. This scenario will eventually have to be dealt with because these quality professionals will become scarce in our schools. By the way, most people who love to teach usually stay in the classroom for many, many years. The lot who soon find the classroom too challenging usually step up to administration in just a few years after starting their teaching careers and are usually not effective teachers.
I do not see how persons with such powerful degrees can be undervalued by school districts. These people did more than enough math to be able to teach math at any level in public schools, and should be considered as assets. I have met people with math education degrees who are uncomfortable with teaching math at
ReplyDeleteany level higher than Algebra 2, just because they spend too much time learning about pedagogy and not learning enough of the subject content matter. In my experience, pedagogy is more about how to dumb-down the subject matter so that students do not have to think. When the teacher has to convert advanced math to a set of rules and steps, the students are not challenged, and that is why American kids can't do math. Come on guys, get real.
Urban schools do not need that kind of brilliant math teachers mentioned above because you have students in calculus who can't do PEMDAS. So, 4(1)^3 = 4. But most of them in a calculus class at First Coast High School, did 4(1)^3 = 64.
ReplyDelete