ALBANY — Substantive changes will be made to testing, teacher evaluations and the Common Core learning standards in New York State, state education commissioner MaryEllen Elia said in a television interview set to air Monday night.
“We’ve already started it,” Elia told WCNY’s Susan Arbetter on "Connect:NY," which airs on PBS.
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She said she understands the concerns of test refusal groups, which have said they will keep urging parents to opt their children out of the state and local exams linked to the teacher evaluations until they see change.
“I understand people saying, ‘Let me see it. I want to see it. I want to touch it. I want to make sure it’s there.’ Well, they’re going to be able to see it and touch it. That’s what we’re doing,” she said.
Uh, huh.
Sure you are.
So far, here's a rundown of the wonderful changes we've gotten in education policy.
Changing the Common Core but keeping the "instructional focus" the same.
De-linking state tests from teacher evaluations for four years, but elevating "local" tests to take their place.
Dunno how delusional Elia is, but if she thinks rhetoric and tweaks are going to fool anybody, she's kidding herself.
Hey Elia, if it looks like shit, feels like shit, and sounds like shit, it's gotta be shit.
ReplyDeleteChapter leader at the school I'm in this month said Cuomo made the change to Common Core because Mulgrew had his foot up Cuomo's ass! This is what Mulgrew is supposedly telling everyone. The chapter leader believes it wholeheartedly. I was completely dumbfounded. I guess this was after he threatened to punch out anyone who was against Common Core. I give no credence what so ever to Elia, Mulgrew, Cuomo, or Weingarten. They are all legends in their own minds.
ReplyDeleteThe state legislature has to enact any substantive changes and Cuomo has to approve the bill. Absent that, nothing is going to change. Parents will hold kids out of the SLOs and the independent observations are going to create havoc. Teachers will still be assigned scores back on test results. This is madness. Everyone can see through this. We are going to 400,000+ opt outs next spring. Bet on it.
ReplyDeleteI am not sure about everyone else, but since I teach in NYC. I am actually looking forward to the outside evaluators. I am a teacher at a cluster school and I do not think the outside evaluator is going to be as big of a hassle as principal observations. Lastly, as far as I can tell, NYC teachers will have only TWO observations next year as opposed to the four to 6 that we currently have. All the other test based aspects of our evaluation is still crap of course.
DeleteAll these moves by Cuomo and Elia is dithering while they wait for the Judge in the Lederman case to force their hand. Ultimately, they are going to have to go back to the legislature to change the evaluation law. But, they need the judge's ruling to give them cover to do so. The can say, "judge made me do it. I wanted to kick all of these teachers in the teeth. But, the judge made me be nice."
ReplyDelete