SB 736 Going to the Floor for Vote

Senate Bill 736,  [AKA The Teacher Quality Bill] is on the fast track.The bill is scheduled for a senate floor vote on the bill for Wednesday, March 9, the second day of the regular legislative session. This bill is controversial because it will link teacher pay to student test scores if passed. The bill also contains an unfunded mandate for additional testing. Curiously for schools purporting to “sell” education to students, it contains provisions mandating that school boards disregard advanced degrees as part of the teacher pay scale. With teachers running amuck in Wisconsin, this should be an interesting issue to follow.

Things Change Quickly via The Gradebook

School recognition funds and Class size count ~ The mad dash to the end of the Florida legislative session is on. It seems sometimes as if it’s hardly worth reporting ideas, as they change almost as fast as they get posted. Here are a couple of updates that might just stick to the end.

I Am a Teacher in Florida

2/6/10 Editor: This was found a a Facebook page during the days immediately preceeding the vote for the House version of SB6. The post was so long it was painstakingly broken up into the alloted comment space, one comment after another. It is posted here in full because it is easier to read in one location. I do not know Cagle Miller-Jamee, but she speaks to me and many others. It is her story and, at the same time, our story too.  Enjoy.

 

I rise before dawn each day and find myself nestled in my classroom hours before the morning commute is in full swing in downtown Orlando. I scour the web along with countless other resources to create meaningful learning experiences for my 24 students each day. I reflect on the successes of lessons taught and re-work ideas until I feel confident that they will meet the needs of my diverse learners. I have finished my third cup of coffee in my classroom before the business world has stirred. My contracted hours begin at 7:00 and end at 3:00. As the sun sets around me and people are beginning to enjoy their dinner, I lock my classroom door, having worked 4 hours unpaid.

  

  

I greet the smiling faces of my students and am reminded anew of their challenges, struggles, successes, failures, quirks, and needs. I review their 504s, their IEPs, their PMPs, their histories trying to reach them from every angle possible. They come in hungry—I feed them. They come in angry—I counsel them. They come in defeated—I encourage them. And this is all before the bell rings. 

  

I am a teacher in Florida. 

  

I am told that every student in my realm must score on or above grade level on the FCAT each year. Never mind their learning discrepancies, their unstable home lives, their prior learning experiences. In the spring, they are all assessed with one measure and if they don’t fit, I have failed. Students walk through my doors reading at a second grade level and by year’s end can independently read and comprehend early 4th grade texts, but this is no matter. One of my students has already missed 30 school days this year, but that is overlooked. If they don’t perform well on this ONE test in early March, their learning gains are irrelevant. They didn’t learn enough. They didn’t grow enough. I failed them. In the three months that remain in the school year after this test, I am expected to begin teaching 5th grade curriculum to my 4th grade students so that they are prepared for next year’s test. 

  

I am a teacher in Florida. 

  

I am expected to create a culture of students who will go on to become the leaders of our world. When they exit my classroom, they should be fully equipped to compete academically on a global scale. They must be exposed to different worldviews and diverse perspectives, and yet, most of my students have never left Sanford, Florida. Field trips are now frivolous. I must provide new learning opportunities for them without leaving the four walls of our classroom. So I plan. I generate new ways to expose them to life beyond their neighborhoods through online exploration and digital field trips. I stay up past The Tonight Show to put together a unit that will allow them to experience St. Augustine without getting on a bus. I spend weekends taking pictures and creating a virtual world for them to experience, since the State has determined it is no longer worthwhile for them to explore reality. Yes. My students must be prepared to work within diverse communities, and yet they are not afforded the right to ever experience life beyond their own town. 

  

I am a teacher in Florida. 

  

I accepted a lower salary with the promise of a small increase for every year taught. I watched my friends with less education than me sign on for six figure jobs while I embraced my $28k starting salary. I was assured as I signed my contract that although it was meager to start, my salary would consistently grow each year. That promise has been broken. I’m still working with a meager salary, and the steps that were contracted to me when I accepted a lower salary are now deemed “unnecessary.” 

  

I am a teacher in Florida. 

  

I spent $2500 in my first year alone to outfit an empty room so that it would promote creative thinking and a desire to learn and explore. I now average between $1000-2000 that I pay personally to supplement the learning experiences that take place in my classroom. I print at home on my personal printer and have burned through 12 ink cartridges this school year alone. I purchase the school supplies my students do not have. I buy authentic literature so my students can be exposed to authors and worlds beyond their textbooks. I am required to teach Social Studies and Writing without any curriculum/materials provided, so I purchase them myself. I am required to conduct Science lab without Science materials, so I buy those, too. The budgeting process has determined that copies of classroom materials are too costly, so I resort to paying for my copies at Staples, refusing to compromise my students’ education because high-ranking officials are making inappropriate cuts. It is February, and my entire class is out of glue sticks. Since I have already spent the $74 allotted to me for warehouse supplies, if I don’t buy more, we will not have glue for the remainder of the year. The projects I dream up are limited by the incomprehensible lack of financial support. I am expected to inspire my students to become lifelong learners, and yet we don’t have the resources needed to nurture their natural sense of wonder if I don’t purchase them myself. My meager earning is now pathetic after the expenses that come with teaching effectively. 

  

I am a teacher in Florida. 

  

The government has scolded me for failing to prepare my students to compete in this technologically driven world. Students in Japan are much more equipped to think progressively with regards to technology. Each day, I turn on the two computers afforded me and pray for a miracle. I apply for grants to gain new access to technology and compete with thousands of other teachers who are hoping for the same opportunity. I battle for the right to use the computer lab and feel fortunate if my students get to see it once a week. Why don’t they know how to use technology? The system’s budget refuses to include adequate technology in classrooms; instead, we are continually told that dry erase boards and overhead projectors are more than enough. 

  

I am a teacher in Florida. 

I went to school at one of the best universities in the country and completed undergraduate and graduate programs in Education. I am a master of my craft. I know what effective teaching entails, and I know how to manage the curriculum and needs of the diverse learners in my full inclusion classroom. I graduated at the top of my class and entered my first year of teaching confident and equipped to teach effectively. Sadly, I am now being micro-managed, with my instruction dictated to me. I am expected to mold “out-of-the-box” thinkers while I am forced to stay within the lines of the instructional plans mandated by policy-makers. I am told what I am to teach and when, regardless of the makeup of my students, by decision-makers far away from my classroom or even my school. The message comes in loud and clear that a group of people in business suits can more effectively determine how to provide exemplary instruction than I can. My expertise is waved away, disregarded, and overlooked. I am treated like a day-laborer, required to follow the steps mapped out for me, rather than blaze a trail that I deem more appropriate and effective for my students—students these decision-makers have never met. 

I am a teacher in Florida. 

  

I am overworked, underpaid, and unappreciated by most. I spend my weekends, my vacations, and my summers preparing for school, and I constantly work to improve my teaching to meet the needs of my students. I am being required to do more and more, and I’m being compensated less and less. 

  

I am a teacher in Florida, not for the pay or the hardships, the disregard or the disrespect; I am a teacher in Florida because I am given the chance to change lives for the good, to educate and elevate the minds and hearts of my students, and to show them that success comes in all shapes and sizes, both in the classroom and in the community. 

  

I am a teacher in Florida today, but as I watch many of my incredible, devoted coworkers being forced out of the profession as a matter of survival, I wonder: How long will I be able to remain a teacher in Florida? 

  

 

Cagle Miller-Jamee

  

  

 

Massive protest targets education bill in Florida Legislature

TALLAHASSEE — Teachers, parents and even some students are flooding the Legislature with e-mails and phone calls. They’re protesting outside lawmakers’ offices and organizing a rally Wednesday at the Capitol.

Their chief target: legislation that would make it easier to fire teachers and base part of their salaries on test scores.

“We just couldn’t sit at home and do nothing while our profession is being attacked,” said Carole Robinson, a biology teacher at Dunedin High School who is driving to Tallahassee for the rally. “There is just no collaboration going on. We were shut out of the process.”

Teachers are focusing their energy on House members and Gov. Charlie Crist, whom they see as their last line of defense on SB 6, the education bill that passed the Senate and is pending in the House.

Crist’s office received 700 calls on the issue last week. House lawmakers have received hundreds of thousands of e-mails and

Is SB6 in the Sunshine?

The comments below were spotted online this morning. As a blogger following this story I have to agree that something is wrong when we can’t get timely information on SB6 and its companion bill as they race through the halls of Tallahassee. Please comment.

Question: As an active citizen in the United States and the State of Florida, I object to how citizens like me became aware of this bill. It was a hush-hush affair that I, reading newspapers, reading the news on the Internet and watching news on TV, only heard of this bill 3 weeks ago when it was announced on Channel 10 News at 6 AM and ONLY then. Even the announcer, Kristi Kruger, was in shock. I could see it on her face (since she works out at my gym, I have gotten to know her). Why was the public not informed as to what was being developed in our Legislator? What happened to the “sunshine laws” in our Sunshine State? It only re-affirms my belief that the Republicans are out to gut public education in the nation in any way they can.

Response: I feel the same way and I knew they were cooking something up. It is so hard to get information. How did the Orlando Sentinel get the updated information for their story on Sunday that none of us could find and we were scouring the bill and Senate websites?

Repost “Myth vs. Fact: The Truth about Reform”

This was written as a public message to Florida voters and Charlie Crist. We could be days away from having a horrible bill passed that will cause veteran teachers to leave thereby flooding Florida classrooms with inexperienced teachers with all of the problems that accompany learning the art of reaching children.  The simple loss of instituitional memory will create chaos. This is controversial and is being shared to generate the conversations necessary to make an informed opinion on SB6 and all of its imposters. This came to Tangerine Florida via the internet and the actual authorship is unclear. Messages seeking to verify the author were sent out earlier. If you are the author or know of the author, please indicate this in a comment. It appears the source is the Florida Education Association.

Note: There are only 3 counties that have tenure in Florida. “Tenure” does not exist for the vast majority of teachers. What they do have is the right to “Due Process” before being fired.

Myth: The current process for evaluating teachers is fine the way it is.

Fact: Last year, 99.7% of teachers in the state earned a “satisfactory” evaluation, yet 50% of our high school students, 35% of our middle school students and 30% of our elementary students didn’t make a year’s worth of progress in reading. (And 60%, 40% and 30%, respectively, were not reading on grade level.) That’s fine?

Real Fact: There is no question that something is askew when 99.7% of teachers received a “satisfactory” evaluation. But here is what we find curious: current law requires school administrators to perform a meaningful evaluation annually based primarily on student performance [Section 1012.34(3)(a), Florida Statutes]. If a small percentage of ineffective teachers remain in their professional services contract status, this is not because of “tenure,” but because of poor evaluation systems managed by either overworked administrators or administrators who are not effectively trained at rating teacher’s performance.

Myth: The bill will eliminate tenure in Florida.

Fact: The bill doesn’t eliminate tenure for teachers in the classroom today. The courts have determined that tenure is a property right and can’t be taken away by the Legislature. The bill does end the practice of granting lifetime guarantee of employment after just three years in the classroom. Instead, new teachers will have annual performance contracts.

Real Fact: Senate Bill 6 does not create “annual performance contracts.” In fact, the annual contracts created may be non-renewed at the end of each year for any reason or no reason. There is no requirement to grant a new annual contract based upon satisfactory “annual performance.” The legislation intends that employees be subject to annual termination decisions based upon reasons which can be wholly arbitrary and unrelated to satisfactory performance. Where in Senate Bill 6 is it provided that a satisfactorily performing teacher will receive an additional annual contract? (There is no such provision)

Myth: Annual tests are not a good measure of teacher effectiveness.Fact: Annual tests are an objective measure of the knowledge and skills students gain from one year to the next. If you believe teachers impact how much a student learns, then annual tests that measure progress are an objective measure of their effectiveness in the classroom.

Real Fact: We like the idea for its simplicity. But, value-added or growth analysis provides a more accurate way to measure student academic progress which tracks the same student over time and compares his/her test scores over several years. Multiple assessments provide a more useful indicator of school and teacher performance than looking at student attainment levels, which is commonly used in public education today. The current system yields an inaccurate comparison because the groups of students, standards and textbooks may be significantly different from year to year. By judging only one score, it is difficult to identify how much of that score was influenced by factors outside of the school as compared to other factors that can be controlled within the school (e.g., the contributions of the teacher and school).

Myth: It’s unfair to base teacher evaluations on student learning.

Fact: Right now, teacher performance reviews are based on the observations and opinions of their principal – making these evaluations 100% subjective. Using data for 50% of the annual performance review makes the evaluation more objective – and therefore, more fair.

Real Fact: The only measurement device in existence currently is the FCAT which only tracks student performance for a small percentage of teachers. Standardized tests measure a narrow band of low-level skills such as recalling or restating facts – rather than the ability to analyze information and other advanced skills. As a result, the tests privilege low-level pedagogy, leaving the best teachers, those with wider repertoires and the ability to move students beyond the basics, at a disadvantage.

Myth: The bill punishes teachers whose students are below grade level.

Fact: The bill doesn’t punish teachers whose students are not on grade level. The bill requires progress – what students learn during the year – to be considered. Teachers can’t control what their students know when they show up on the first day of school, but they do influence what they learn during the year in their class. In fact, measuring progress may benefit teachers who teach students with disabilities and low-performing students the most.

Real Fact: When student achievement is tied to accountability systems, value-added analysis provides a fairer method to measure school and teacher impact on student achievement because it takes into account where a student started the school year academically and how much that student grew.
Judging a school’s or teacher’s performance by looking at student academic attainment levels is unfair because some students may enter a teacher’s classroom already at high levels of achievement — or conversely, several grade levels behind their peers. Without considering the academic growth teachers and schools are able to make with their students, some teachers and schools may inaccurately be attributed with making a significant impact while others may be unfairly penalized. SB 6 doesn’t provide a fair and valid process to measure that growth among teachers, subject areas, grade levels, schools nor school districts.

Myth: The bill cuts teacher pay.
Fact: Under the bill, the more students learn, the more teachers earn. The bill requires at least half of teacher salaries to be based on whether students are learning. It also raises salaries for teachers in high-poverty schools and teachers of subjects that are in high demand, such as math and science.

Real Fact: Teachers are professionals with advanced degrees! Their compensation package must reflect these additional responsibilities, increased knowledge and skills and loyalty to the profession. Minimally, the work contract for these professionals should be an expansion of their current contracts. Typically, this would imply an increase in pay. In this current financial environment where public education has sustained huge cuts, it becomes difficult for teachers to trust the funding will be sustained to support increases in pay when every performance based pay plan for the past decade has either been cut or eliminated. SB 6 includes such provisions- Dale Hickam Excellent Teaching Program and the Merit Award Program.

More Senate Retirement Mayhem

This is another bill that proposes changes in the Florida Retirement System including that retirement contributions made by the employer will be subject to taxes. Please comment if you can add insight to this bill. Information is not easy to come by and Florida’s public employees need your help.

Florida Senate – 2010                             CS for SB 2022
      
      
      
       By the Policy and Steering Committee on Ways and Means; and
       Senator Alexander
      
      
      
       576-03752-10                                          20102022c1
    1                        A bill to be entitled                     
    2         An act relating to the Florida Retirement System;
    3         amending s. 121.011, F.S.; deleting a provision
    4         ensuring certain rights of members of the system;
    5         providing for employee and employer contributions;
    6         providing that the rights of members are of a
    7         contractual nature; amending s. 121.021, F.S.;
    8         redefining the terms “prior service,” “termination,”
    9         “benefit,” and “payee”; amending s. 121.051, F.S.;
   10         requiring that a local governmental entity or the
   11         governing body of a charter school or charter
   12         technical career center make certain elections
   13         regarding benefits at the time the entity or governing
   14         body joins the Florida Retirement System;

The Policy Steering Committee on Ways and Means Committee Vote Record from Thursday March 25, 2010