A new ad from the state’s largest teachers union criticizes Gov. Dannel P. Malloy’s education reform plan while urging people to listen “to our teachers” instead.
The 30-second ad by the Connecticut Education Association began airing on March 17. Ten seconds in, the ad turns ominously dark when the narrator discusses the proposed reforms.
“Governor Malloy’s plan doesn’t get it right: taking control away from local school districts and giving it the State Education Commissioner, allowing principals to decide which teachers are certified and siphoning tax dollars away from our Connecticut schools.”
Malloy’s senior adviser criticized the ad.
“It’s unfortunate that CEA has chosen to air an ad in which they intentionally misstate the facts in order to try and mislead people,” Roy Occhiogrosso told the Journal Inquirer. “The governor’s plan maintains local control, implements an evaluation system both teachers unions have agreed to, and increases funding for education by $128 million.”
One of the main elements of Malloy’s plan for the best teachers, to restructure tenure so that it has to be continually earned and to provide more money to troubled schools across the state.
Under his proposed $128 million education agenda, 80 percent would go to the worst districts. In order for the schools to get the money, districts would have to “embrace key reforms,” with tenure changes being one of them.
Unions were first enacted to protect a disadvantaged employee from an advantaged employer. But public sector employees actually vote in their own management, so they should have no qualms with management decisions. I vote for disbanding the CEA and NEA.
Unions have put a growing wedge between the parents and the teachers basically making it necessary for parents to force themselves back into the process. I saw the change clearly in the 90's when my son was in elementary school. By the time he graduated in 2006 parents were received like poison ivy...unless they were in full support of the annual budget.
They always agree that education reform is needed, and say that "everything should be on the table." Trouble is, when anybody puts ANYTHING on the table -- tenure reform, vouchers, more charter schools, longer school days/years, better use of technology to increase educational efficiency, etc. they quickly reject it out of hand. But, as teachers' union president Albert Shanker once explained, "When schoolchildren start paying union dues, that’s when I’ll start representing the interests of schoolchildren." It's too bad parents, students and taxpayers don't have a union to represent their interests.
This will cause me to be shot, however it is worth consideration. Parents are reasonably expecting more from teachers. With higher salaries are arguably higher expectations. I have had taxpayers shocked at the compensation amounts that in some cases are much more than the parents of the kids they teach. Teachers at one point in history were highly respected, yet poorly paid, with a decent or "OK" pension. Today a teacher is arguably well paid. Another issue in teaching is a teachers' curriculum are being so heavily managed [database systems], as it has been reported to me by teachers. Hence my argument teaching is now more science than art. Could I be a teacher. Nope. I admit it! Teachers are due our respect. I am just trying to point out some issues I have heard from stakeholders. Windsor BoE Budget: http://www.windsorct.org/boe/reports/documents/12.03.01_FY2012-2013_Recommended_Budget.pdf; Page 71
"To justify their campaign, ed reformers repeat, mantra-like, that U.S. students are trailing far behind their peers in other nations, that U.S. public schools are failing. The claims are specious. Two of the three major international tests—the Progress in International Reading Literacy Study and the Trends in International Math and Science Study—break down student scores according to the poverty rate in each school. The tests are given every five years. The most recent results (2006) showed the following: students in U.S. schools where the poverty rate was less than 10 percent ranked first in reading, first in science, and third in math. When the poverty rate was 10 percent to 25 percent, U.S. students still ranked first in reading and science. But as the poverty rate rose still higher, students ranked lower and lower. Twenty percent of all U.S. schools have poverty rates over 75 percent. The average ranking of American students reflects this. The problem is not public schools; it is poverty. And as dozens of studies have shown, the gap in cognitive, physical, and social development between children in poverty and middle-class children is set by age three."