Doug Prouty

Commander in Chief of MCEA, Doug Prouty, made a speech (hail youtube) about the problems associated with Maryland's Race to the Top application.

Same mind-boggling crap
1) "I guarantee you, that every single teacher, every single lesson, he or she is thinking about what went well, what could have been improved, and they're working on that every single day in the classroom (Are you kidding? This has got to be a bad joke. Unless of course, you talk to every single teacher after every single lesson.)
2) The PAR system we created in 2000 is the bomb (because no one gets dismissed)
3) Be afraid of standardized testing.

Conflict looms

The Washington Post notes a show down could be looming between the state and MCPS over the proposed requirement that student achievement data be 50% or more of teacher evaluations. I'm not married to 25% or 50% or 75%, but I also know that if you attach some sort of merit based pay to achievement or to sound instruction or to parent surveys or to student surveys (yes, students surveys) you're going to have a better system. There is no incentive other than pure intrinsic motivation for mediocre teachers to get better. There's no incentive for teacher's to teach in ways that are out of their comfort zone. So why change? Let me tell you from someone who knows. They don't.

From the article:

Teaching is an incredibly complex art, and prescribing this high a percentage in terms of one area . . . undervalues teachers," said Doug Prouty, president of the Montgomery County Education Association. He said the regulations might jeopardize the county's peer-review evaluation system, which uses observations, test scores and other factors to determine how well teachers are doing.

Wrong. You can keep your peer review if you simply choose to revamp what you've already got. And what undervalues teachers, is having teachers get paid based on whether they show up for work, and for how many years they keep doing it, rather than whether they deliver a high quality product. Every day an ineffective teacher remains in their job is an insult to the teachers who work hard every day to be good at what they do.

From the MCPS page

Their title: MCPS, MCEA Agree on Use of Student Performance Data in Evaluations


My title: Weast and Prouty agree state law doesn't require any change! Rejoice.

In the Post

The Maryland legislature recently passed a new law that says test scores will be a "significant" component of teacher evaluations. All this to get in line to receive "Race to the Top" funds doled out by the Obama administration. Sounds like a start. Doesn't a good teacher help students learn? And how do we measure learning? Assessment. The Washington Post reports that the MCEA and school system leaders agreed to make 1/3rd of teacher evaluations dependent on test scores. Then Doug Prouty, MCEA President, promptly sends this email to union members that says nothing has changed, nor should it. Montgomery County is the model!

We have not changed our evaluation in anyway. We have no intention of doing so. The Teacher Professional Growth System has served us well for the past ten years and is a model for other systems around the country. The focus on collecting authentic data through formal and informal observations, bolstered by other data sources (including student achievement) has provided more meaningful feedback to teachers than the previous evaluation system or that currently being used by any other county in Maryland. The structured support for teachers and other educators the system provides is also unique in our state.

If MCEA doesn't think our evaluation system should imporve, or that the current law doesn't provide an opportunity to improve it, they are taking a decidedly narrow approach. It takes two years to remove even the most ineffective tenured teacher. Further, test scores are used in name only. Two out of six standards by which teachers are evaluated have mention of the use of assessment data. To say that test scores are already a significant portion of the Montgomery County evaluation system could not be further from reality.