Valerie Strauss: About the Suicide of an LA Teacher...

[YvonneCa]

...here:

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/answer-sheet/teachers/about-the-suicice-of-an-la-tea.html

Be sure to read the comments, too.

[EFerrari]

1. Well done column and well done comments. K&R.

[proud2BlibKansan]

2. wow

Let’s be clear: The newspaper’s database and its score are not responsible for the suicide of 39-year-old Rigoberto Ruelas.
..........................
Let us remember that the Secretary of Education want this type of information released to parents.

"Education secretary Arne Duncan will call on districts across the nation to make information on teachers public."

Would any American want a major newspaper in the United States to publish their name on a list as inadequate?

The test scores and teachers names may have been public knowledge but this released information did not indicate anything specific public data about the teachers in regard to effectiveness.

The newspaper created on their own a model to evaluate the teachers based upon the public data and then published their evaluations and not evaluations that were in the public domain.

"The Times hired Richard Buddin, a senior economist and education researcher at Rand Corp., to conduct a "value-added" analysis of the data."

I hope that there are lawsuits galore.

It is not difficult to claim damages based upon the public damaging of an individual's reputation and their losses in their ability to gain employment.

Even when the names of murderers when published in newspapers are published with the word alleged.

It appears that besides releasing public information with the name of teachers there probably also was the release of the names of students. Would any parent want the name of their child appearing in a major newspaper as a failing student?

We have really reached absurdity in regard to public education.

Teachers are being treated shabbily with a major newspaper publicly humiliating them. Meanwhile teachers are blamed for all the problems in public education by the President and this is the reasoning of his policy of making teachers accountable. If teachers would do their job supposedly every child would learn.

At the same time as the President and his policies makes teaching in public schools totally undesirable as a career, Americans are told that the nation needs more qualified teachers in the public schools.

The reality is that the policies and actions of this President only discourage any American from pursuing a career in public education.

I think it about time for every public education teacher in the United States to urge Democrats to select a new Democratic candidate for the election of President in the 2012.

Posted by: bsallamack | September 28, 2010 8:42 PM

[Luminous Animal]

3. This is something I did not know

"The newspaper created on their own a model to evaluate the teachers based upon the public data and then published their evaluations and not evaluations that were in the public domain.

"The Times hired Richard Buddin, a senior economist and education researcher at Rand Corp., to conduct a "value-added" analysis of the data.""


Until I read this, I thought the (wrong-headed) value added analysis was initiated by the district not the L.A. Times. So the L.A. times created their own facts and then reported on those facts.

Wow.

[proud2BlibKansan]

5. Yep that's what they did

Despicable, isn't it?

[Luminous Animal]

6. It looks like me and you had our "wow" moment at the same time.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=9227162&mesg_id=9227183

[Hannah Bell]

10. yep. and the funding for the analysis was channeled through a non-profit given start-up

funding & ongoing funding by -- tuh-duh!

The Gates Foundation, one of the top 3 ed deform funders! (Gates, Broad, Walton)

[Tansy_Gold]

4. I read about a half dozen of the comments

All were literate, save for the occasional typo or minor error.

I knew they were written by teachers -- by teachers who cared.


K & R



TG, NTY

[dkf]

7. If this analysis wasn't even the school's then this should have had no impact on his job.

The guy killed himself over some criticism in the paper? I sure hope that isn't the case.

[Luminous Animal]

8. Blaming the victim, are we? No comment about the Times publicly shaming someone based on...

their own flawed analysis?

It would have an impact on his job. His students would read it. The parents of his students would read it. And they would use it as a measure to judge him. Whether or not admin deemed him capable of keeping his job despite the L.A. Times flawed reporting, his chosen profession compelled him to answer to his kids and their parents.

[Hannah Bell]

11. It was part of a propaganda campaign to get the populace on board to shut down LA schools as well --

& hand them over to Green Dot charters (funding by the Broad Foundation)

[merqz]

12. A newspaper published FLAWED ANALYSIS?

color me shocked! Assuming it was flawed analysis, and generally speaking, if one disagrees with any analysis of anything, it's easy to call it "flawed"... part of free press is stuff like this. Assuming they got this information legally, they are free to apply any analysis they wish to apply and publish the results. I am NOT saying they should have done this. I am saying they have the legal right to do this. And if newspapers could be sued for "flawed analysis", newspapers couldn't provide the function they provide.

Libel and slander laws are pretty well written. Saying somebody is "inadequate" or "uneffective" based on an analysis of data about them is an OPINION.

[dkf]

14. Goodness what is there to blame about the guy?

It's obviously tragic. What surprises me is his job wasn't in jeopardy because this wasn't an analysis by his employer. Was it actually overblown in it's implications and is that what pushed him over the edge? Maybe the irony is that the pushback was so over the top in what it said this analysis meant that he reacted to those opinions.

[JDPriestly]

9. The author of this story says that people have the right to know

and then admits that the LA Times' method for evaluating teachers is not accurate.

Problem is, there is no accurate way to evaluate teachers. My favorite math teacher was hated by just about everybody else in the class. Math was easy for me. I just wanted to work the problems and be left alone to do my homework. My teacher was perfect. She never explained much of anything. She just graded our papers and handed them back. At least that was my experience. Fact is, I was doing my homework during the class so that I could practice my violin when I got home, so I probably wasn't paying much attention to what she was doing. She never bothered me or scolded me for that. I got excellent grades in her class (and that was not the case in a lot of other classes) and thought she was great. Just about everyone else thought she was awful.

So how do you evaluate a teacher like that -- or any teacher for that matter?

The teaching style that works for one student doesn't work for another one. Does the majority rule on teacher styles -- in every class all the time? What about a kid like me who does not fit the mold? Shouldn't I have a teacher who teaches according to my mold once in a while? Teachers should be dedicated and reliable and work well with people and above all know their subject matter well. If they rate well in all of those areas, they should be given high marks for sticking with a profession that takes a lot of humility, patience, hard work and love of kids and all for relatively little compensation (compared to jobs with comparable responsibility in the business world).

[merqz]

13. How do you evaluate a politician, a cop, a govt. administrator, a legislator, etc?

There is no simple formula. Whether or not their formula for these analysis sucked, and whether or not they SHOULD have done it, they are, based on what I have seen thus far, clearly w/in their legal rights to do so.