In the previous post about noted sycophant Mark Polazzo came a comment that instead of commenting on
in the little comment box I wish to share out on the open.
"....The first piece of contradiction lies in the fact that you point out that Matthew Polazzo was the former Coordinator of Student Affairs and was therefore a teacher outside the classroom. Unlike perhaps the COSA in your school, at Stuyvesant High School, the COSA is a teacher who teaches at least four classes a day and also devotes their last period and after-school time to work as the COSA, and yes in an office."
Hey, if wrong, then we here at SBSB will admit it. But, Matthew decided to represent himself as this "big shot" coordinator. What is girl to think?
".....Also, in terms of reading comprehension, when Matthew Polazzo refers to teachers outside the classroom, you clear well know that he is referring to teachers in the rubber rooms."
Where oh where does Matthew make that clear? Here is the quote:
Even hotter is the buzz about what to do with teachers who get paid for staying outside the classroom. This is in the first paragraph. Where does he qualify it as teacher's in the Rubber Room?
"You are also an educator who is complacent with the way things remain in the New York City Educational system."
Obviously you have not read the entire blog and seen how it shook up the powers that be last year. I suggest you give it a thorough reading and then comment. As far as me being complacent, where are your facts? Do you know me? Do you know anything?
"Unfortunately, as the citizens of this city realize the terrible quality of education they are being forced to deal with, they will take action by voting and by demanding reform."
The only reform has been rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. Smoke and mirrors baby.
"You shouldn't defend the UFT contract as it stands in dealing with poor teachers."
How do you define a poor teacher? Please do.
"The contract may very well protect teachers from abusive administrators and from being forced out because of false accusations, neither Matthew Polazzo nor anyone else is demanding for these provisions to be removed, nor should they ever be removed..."
As previously stated, fine no problem with getting rid of poor teachers. Define a poor teacher. But the Rubber Room was a place for teachers that were accused of being a danger to children. Now you get teachers there who after 25 years get a U rating in the middle of the year, who have had a Diet Coke in their hand, who have blown the whistle, who report abuse. That is the majority in the Rubber Room.
".....all we are asking for is a different regulatory measure by which to insure quality teaching."
Define quality teaching.
19 comments:
Perhaps this is why teachers need more than just an administrator's rating to define quality teaching. Perhaps this is why we need some system of student evaluation, as they do in universities and colleges, which the previous contract would not allow. Perhaps what's really wrong with our education system is the teacher-student relationship. Perhaps that's what needs to be fixed. While we understand that teachers are also employees, that still does not mean they should ignore the fact that they are also mentors and that they can even learn from their own students. While teachers try hard to hide the UFT-DOE debacle from their students, there's no question that this fight over merit pay vs. seniority pay or mayoral control vs. BOE does directly affect us and the education we receive. I hate to see my teacher, who has been a wonderful teacher, being attacked this way.
Sorry your teacher is getting attacked. I am sure he is a good teacher, but next time he should have all the facts before he writes.
As for a system of student evaluation not a bad idea, but what about elementary teachers? Should/can 1st graders be privy to this? Kindegarten kids I am sure can draw a picture.
As far as merit pay, if you use test scores to give teachers merit pay, then what about the the Phys Ed. teacher, art teacher, music, deans, etc...?
Should we even bother to argue against a teacher so deranged that said teacher even blogs about farting? http://southbronxschool.blogspot.com/2008/12/farting-can-be-harmful-to-your-career.html
Hmm, no thanks.
"You shouldn't defend the UFT contract as it stands in dealing with poor teachers."
How do you define a poor teacher? Please do.
Contained within the phrasing of this challenge is the presumption that it cannot be done, or done well. While a perfect teacher rating system may be impossible, that does not mean we should throw our hands up in concession. Equally difficult to gauge is a student's level of learning, and yet the very notion of grades does just that, not to mention standardized tests. Surely there are more useful ways to evaluate a teacher's ability than the two three ways currently employed.
Robert brought up a good point in his comment on the original post. Why are teachers afforded a level of job security unheard of in any other profession? The primary goal of the education system is to educate students. When a teacher is not able to carry out that goal, he or she should be removed. They are simply no longer doing their job, and if that happened in any other setting the worker would be fired.
I understand that not every teacher is going to be inspirational (though you may disagree with his article, ask any of his students, Mr. Polazzo is). But as a student it is very clear which teachers have bothered to draw up lesson plans, and which have do not; who knows the material they are teaching, and who does not. A major problem is that the city is constantly struggling to attract well qualified teachers. If the system promoted young, exciting teachers instead of encouraging poor ones to stay in the system, this would be less of an issue.
Get a fucking grip, sir. How can you be a public school teacher and still write such a poorly edited, poorly argued blog? Oh wait, I forgot that this is a system that protects shitty teachers and lacks serious pay-based incentives. And before you ask me to "define" any of my terms, maybe you should think about the words I (and everyone else commenting on this, and Polazzo) use and then decipher their meaning. That's generally the approach to reading a sentence.
Wow, vitriol!
I'll say this: you keep coming back to defining what makes a good teacher and a bad teachers.
Some people have taken a stab at this endeavor. Visit your nearest charter school and talk to administrators about teacher evaluation there.
Even with (typically) no contractual protections, teachers at charters aren't being fired for blowing whistles (they'd usually walk first if they had something to blow about) or holding diet Coke cans (though we know that Coke kills), but for not following through on the responsibilities that they agreed to take on. These are drawn from either the school's own home made recipe for teacher success, possibly with teacher input, or a commercial set of ideas such as Charlotte Danielson's model or the Skillful Teacher.
Kitchen Sink,
How nice of you to take time out from your busy day running a charter school to come to this blog and leave a comment. Things must be easier over there than we think.
And to the students at Stuyvesant: Did you just find out about this blog on your own, or did your fabulous teacher point it out to you, using you for his own private political interests? And why aren't you talking about all the other fabulous teachers at Stuyvesant? Or is he the only one? Are there any low quality teachers that should be out? Your favorite teacher seems to think so, especially if they are getting paid more than him.
He put his foot in the muck and now wants his students to rescue him.
I'm a student at Brooklyn Tech and I stumbled upon this through a facebook group.
I don't really have anything to say about this whole conflict.
But damn! ed notes on line you old as fuck! Did Jesus Christ really preform miracles? Did he actually look like Cesare Borgia or did the white man just paint him in his image? Let me know, thanks.
Quite to the contrary, Mr. Polazzo made no demand of his students to haul him out of this maelstrom of criticism directed towards him. In fact, the following day in class, it was established that he had taken the advice of many colleagues who had published works and refused to look at the comments posted online because, as often is the case, such a forum descends speedily into "flame wars." I personally have also had a close friend of his as another teacher of mine, and, in fact, I have had the fortune of joining the two of them for lunch on more than one occasion and even thrown a dinner for them and other students.
This does not, of course, even begin to reference the terrific skill of many other teachers I have had the fortune to have (I fully intend to present one of them with a bottle of 89 d'Yquem as a token of my gratefulness). My current English teacher has been in my school for many decades, and in fact championed a teacher movement against student panels in plagiarism cases--these are not unreasonable men. Another teacher of mine has served for well over a dozen years, and she is in fact the union representative. Both these teachers were terrific, and I am sure they make quite the shiny shilling.
Similarly, I have had quite a slew of rather poor teachers who taught poorly and dealt out horrific grades that were undeserved (to the whole class, mind you, not me in particular) or, arguable worse, taught poorly and handed back high grades to appease the hoi polloi. Many of these teachers remain on board solely due to the tenure provided by the union, and none of them have any right in the realm of education, except for their antiquated teaching degrees that they may have earned years past but by no means deserve.
Mr. Polazzo did personally address the source of his own rather lower salary, and it is for a technical reason that does not involve the union or the amount of time he has been in the educational system. He was openly frank about it with my class, and he made no references towards others who may not deserve their own salaries.
I have personally served on the board (Although unfortunately not under Mr. Polazzo) that negotiates with teachers, principals, and PA, and I would argue that in many cases, the union does serve an irreplaceable and invaluable service for the teachers. However, much to my chagrin, the union allows very little flexibility, and, towards a school that has been brutalized by the budget cuts, it shows little to no sympathy or understanding. School trips keep getting dramatically cut and the union fails to allow teachers, who would otherwise be willing, to volunteer in certain roles. Should a solution to a problem ever be proposed, and in the rare case that the administration, teachers, and students all agree, there is inevitably some sort of union obstruction.
In your latest comment, you made a glaring and unfounded accusation of student manipulation towards a man you claim may very well be a good teacher (a great contradiction to begin with), whilst dealing snide accusations of jealousy that are similarly unfounded. The union, although I am not totally learned on its contract, proves a great hindrance to the efficiency of the educational system—if teachers really live in perpetual fear of their administrators, should not administrator accountability be of greater concern as well then? You are, appreciably, not fully informed of the debate regarding course evaluations, and as a quick note, I will mention it was on a far smaller and more informal scale than you believe it to me
Lastly, a few quick notes regarding your post—there is no place where Mr. Polazzo painted himself as a big shot; he merely stated his position. You gave poor context to the paying of teachers outside of classroom quotes as well—the sentence referenced a “buzz,” and the following sentence then proceeded to explain what said “buzz” referred to. A poor teacher is obviously a vague definition, but it generally refers to something along the lines of someone who cannot deliver a satisfactory amount of content
continued --- to his students and/or treats them unfairly (excluding the indignant roars of poor students). And merit pay based on test scores is one idea—obviously the positions you reference would fall under a different pay scheme. The point is, accountability is necessary. Unfortunately, I have top 20 universities to apply to, LSAT’s to look forward to, and a prosperous career outside of the quagmire of union dominated high school teaching in order to find the time to properly compose the teaching reform equivalent of Reaganomics.
And to the students at Stuyvesant: Did you just find out about this blog on your own, or did your fabulous teacher point it out to you, using you for his own private political interests? And why aren't you talking about all the other fabulous teachers at Stuyvesant? Or is he the only one? Are there any low quality teachers that should be out? Your favorite teacher seems to think so, especially if they are getting paid more than him.
He put his foot in the muck and now wants his students to rescue him.
Responding to ed online...
Oh you ignorant buffoon. Did you really think that we would need any incentive to defend one of our most outstanding teachers, namely when he is being attacked for presenting valid points? Naturally if someone writes a controversial article, we would have the curiosity and take the initiative to look further into it, to see what everyone else thinks of the article. Oops that was too bold of me; perhaps it is not so natural for one such as yourself.
The reason he is presenting such points in his article merely proves that we need to extinguish these low quality teachers from the educational system. Even Stuyvesant, which is regarded as an elitist school, is being lagged down by mediocre teachers that are protected by the union. A great many of us have had to deal with many such teachers during our four years at Stuyvesant and we can personally attest to the stupidity and uselessness of some of the teaching staff. But can we change anything? I should think not, not with the union protecting them. And you ask why we're not talking about our "other fabulous teachers." The answer is quite simple (again, perhaps too bold a statement because it appears not to be simple to you); they're not under attack for presenting their positions on the matter. Why should we bother to mention our "other fabulous teachers" when they're already doing outstanding work? And by that I mean what they're supposed to do.
I know it a bit difficult, but try to actually think before commenting on anything profound.
To Ed Notes Online –
Please do not address myself and my classmates in such a demeaning manner. The fact that we are students, and not “adults” in the legal sense, does not mean that we cannot make comments that reflect our beliefs and not our teachers’. We may be younger than you, but that does not mean we do not deserve the same respect you would show to an “adult”. Why would you think Mr. Polazzo would ask his students to defend him from the ramblings of an irate teacher? There is no motive. Your statement is similar to me saying that you do not really oppose a contract change, but that you are merely a union puppet, arguing this way because you were told to. That statement would be equally as ridiculous as yours. We respect your opinion as yours’; please show us that same respect. You may or may not believe that our teacher did not direct us to this blog, but I am telling you the truth, and it is up to you whether or not to believe me.
Moving on, I am not quite sure why we would be discussing the many other wonderful teachers at our school, seeing as this is really not a discussion about them. However, I will humor you.
My junior year I took honors pre-calculus, one of the most difficult classes I have taken at Stuy. I had a teacher who challenged us every day, and although I did not always do well on tests, and spent hours each night doing his homework; I left the class a much better mathematician than when I entered.
Another amazing teacher I had was my chemistry teacher in sophomore year. This teacher was in his twenties and had a post doc in chemistry. He taught us beyond the curriculum, and many days for two straight periods. Even the students in the class who had no interest in chemistry, learned to love the subject.
The aforementioned teachers share an important similarity: They truly respect their students. Someone like yourself who believes students are merely echoing the voice of their teacher is not someone who shows that vital respect for students that makes good teachers great.
Unfortunately, I have also had teachers that I do not believe belong in that profession. Now, before I get a barrage of comments claiming these are the hard teachers that made me work etc. etc. and I dislike them because of that, let me make it clear that this is false. Some of these teachers have given me my highest grades, and been the easiest teachers I have encountered. These are the teachers that allow students to write their own college recommendations, and sign off on them. These are the teachers that play a movie for two straight weeks in class. These are the teachers that do not respect their students.
It is unfortunate that because a teacher is advocating merit pay, everyone assumes he is bitter about being paid less than his colleagues. This is truly not the case. As a student I can tell the difference between a teacher motivated by pay and one motivated by helping his students. Mr. Polazzo clearly falls in the second of the two categories (an opinion that is held by many of his students aside from me).
Please think before you make rash, insulting comments.
-Seth
I agree with the above Anonymous poster;
RESPONSE ed online::
And to the students at Stuyvesant: Did you just find out about this blog on your own, or did your fabulous teacher point it out to you, using you for his own private political interests? And why aren't you talking about all the other fabulous teachers at Stuyvesant? Or is he the only one? Are there any low quality teachers that should be out? Your favorite teacher seems to think so, especially if they are getting paid more than him.
-----
No, the students of Stuyvesant found this blog on THEIR OWN (things spread pretty quickly if you're socially networked/ scour the internet for news, especially in a school like Stuyvesant). Mr. Polazzo actually had to set aside some time to address how *popular* the article has become in his classes.
There are certainly more great teachers at Stuyvesant. And then there are the REALLY bad ones. Why the majority of students support Polazzo's side is because we want the good teachers to be paid more for their efforts and we want the bad teachers to have an incentive to teach better.
And yes, I think there are some teachers in Stuyvesant that should be outed. Plenty would agree with me on this one.
Mr. Polazzo actually wanted to stay away from the Daily News comments section (which was one of the reasons why the article come out half-baked online, and was edited after his students pointed it out to him). He knows how comments online can suddenly turn into a flame war (and trolling) and wanted to stay away from that. Also, his activism has caused a bit of tension with his co-workers at school anyway, stemming from this in the past and the current.
In fact, Mr. Polazzo does not take sides during our discussions in class. He typically plays devils advocate and lets his students see the discussion in different perspective.
again, RESPONSE::
He put his foot in the muck and now wants his students to rescue him.
-------
Polazzo has always sided with the rights of students in many situations in the past, and has been praised and flamed by his colleagues by it. This isn't the first time he has done something controversial, and he certainly needs no such "rescuing." (Though, it would probably gives him a moral boost to see his students rallying behind him. But again, he doesn't visit his work online and tries to stay miles away from it so he doesn't get caught in the craziness there.)
To assume that anybody can determine what a "good or bad teacher" is, based upon an Administrator opinion is unrealistic. However, maybe a combination of student comments, Regents grades(high school with similar student populations & class sizes), and peer evaluation would be a start.
To assume that all teachers in the "rubber rooms" are bad and a threat to the students just show how ignorant the commenters are to the real world of the NYC classroom.
Seth, I must agree with you. Ed Online seems very condescending due to the fact that he is older. But he might possibly be the oldest man on Earth. He's a walking fossil for god's sake!
There would be no need for us to defend Mr. Polazzo if this post didn't attack him directly, calling him a "sphincter suckler", instead of his views.
So what if Mr. Polazzo were a hypocrite, though I don't believe he is. His points nevertheless are valid. I'm terribly disappointed in not only how basic this "article" is, but also by how poorly it argues against the original article. 'N/A' for instance, or "what context was the student dragged down the stairs", which to the authors credit, it seems he/she apologized for. But things like, "define poor teaching". Clearly the article is not comprehensive, and inherent in stating that we must dispel of poor teachers, is that a definition of poor teachers must be achieved. There certainly are valid counter-points to be made, but none of them are presented here.
Those of us who know Mr. Polazzo though, and have spoken to him about this issue know that he has considered the issue through and through, and would be well able to defend himself.
Anon,
It's nice to hear that you agree with me, but making comments like: "He's a walking fossil for god's sake!" are the reason people do not show students the respect they deserve. If we wish to be treated as adults, we must act as such.
-Seth
"How do you define a poor teacher? Please do."
You know how I define a poor teacher? One who teaches the same material every day, forcing the entire class to fall behind other same-level classes. So when finals week rolls around (and the final is department-wide), those students only know about half of the material. I had one of those. He waved a pitchfork around and called one of the students "Devil".
Another way to define a bad teacher: one who shows racist films and agrees with them. One who is blatantly ignorant of other cultures and attempts to force his opinion about such matters on the students. One whose questions for discussion are "isn't that disgusting?" (in reference to transvestites) rather than asking for an actual open-ended question.
Yes these teachers are still in the classroom and the contract is the reason students are still subjected to these teachers.
Thanks guys, I appreciate missing half a semester's material and having that ruin my math average as well as my future math courses.
Thanks a lot, Contract, for providing me with a decent education.
You should be ashamed of yourselves.
What's really scary is how many Stuy students are ageist in their views, which is no better than being racist. Shame on you and how you reflect on your school.
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