April 06, 2007
No Dentist Left Behind
I'm in favor of accountability in education, but there are other viewpoints as well, viewpoints that need to be considered. The following was forwarded to me by my beloved daughter Jennifer, a teacher of some experience and who has been "Teacher of The year" early in her career. Read it, think about it.
No Dentist Left Behind
My dentist is great! He sends me reminders so I don't forget checkups.
He uses the latest techniques based on research. He never hurts me, and I've got all my teeth.
When I ran into him the other day, I was eager to see if he'd heard about the new state program. I knew he'd think it was great.
"Did you hear about the new state program to measure effectiveness of dentists with their young patients?" I said.
"No," he said. He didn't seem too thrilled. "How will they do that?"
"It's quite simple," I said. "They will just count the number of cavities each patient has at age 10, 14, and 18 and average that to determine a dentist's rating. Dentists will be rated as excellent, good, average, below average, and unsatisfactory. That way parents will know which are the best dentists. The plan will also encourage the less effective dentists to get better," I said. "Poor dentists who don't improve could lose their licenses to practice."
"That's terrible," he said.
"What? That's not a good attitude," I said. "Don't you think we should try to improve children's dental health in this state?"
"Sure I do," he said, "but that's not a fair way to determine who is practicing good dentistry."
"Why not?" I said. "It makes perfect sense to me."
"Well, it's so obvious," he said. "Don't you see that dentists don't all work with the same clientele, and that much depends on things we can't control? For example, I work in a rural area with a high percentage of patients from deprived homes, while some of my colleagues work in upper middle-class neighborhoods. Many of the parents I work with don't bring their children to see me until there is some kind of problem, and I don't get to do much preventive work. Also many of the parents I serve let their kids eat way too much candy from an early age, unlike more educated parents who understand the relationship between sugar and decay. To top it all off, so many of my clients have well water which is untreated and has no fluoride in it. Do you have any idea how much difference early use of fluoride can make?"
"It sounds like you're making excuses," I said. "I can't believe that you, my dentist, would be so defensive. After all, you do a great job, and you needn't fear a little accountability."
"I am not being defensive!" he said. "My best patients are as good as anyone's, my work is as good as anyone's, but my average cavity count is going to be higher than a lot of other dentists because I chose to work where I am needed most."
"Don't get touchy," I said.
"Touchy?" he said. His face had turned red, and from the way he was clenching and unclenching his jaws, I was afraid he was going to damage his teeth.
"Try furious! In a system like this, I will end up being rated average, below average, or worse. The few educated patients I have who see these ratings may believe this so-called rating is an actual measure of my ability and proficiency as a dentist. They may leave me, and I'll be left with only the most needy patients. And my cavity average score will get even worse. On top of that, how will I attract good dental hygienists and other excellent dentists to my practice if it is labeled below average?"
"I think you are overreacting," I said. "'Complaining, excuse-making and stonewalling won't improve dental health'...I am quoting from a leading member of the DOC," I noted.
"What's the DOC?" he asked.
"It's the Dental Oversight Committee," I said, "a group made up of mostly lay persons to make sure dentistry in this state gets improved."
"Spare me," he said, "I can't believe this. Reasonable people won't buy it," he said hopefully.
The program sounded reasonable to me, so I asked, "How else would you measure good dentistry?"
"Come watch me work," he said. "Observe my processes."
"That's too complicated, expensive and time- consuming," I said. "Cavities are the bottom line, and you can't argue with the bottom line.
It's an absolute measure."
"That's what I'm afraid my parents and prospective patients will think. This can't be happening," he said despairingly.
"Now, now," I said, "don't despair. The state will help you some."
"How?" he asked.
"If you receive a poor rating, they'll send a dentist who is rated excellent to help straighten you out," I said brightly.
"You mean," he said, "they'll send a dentist with a wealthy clientele to show me how to work on severe juvenile dental problems with which I have probably had much more experience? BIG HELP!"
"There you go again," I said. "You aren't acting professionally at all."
"You don't get it," he said. "Doing this would be like grading schools and teachers on an average score made on a test of children's progress with no regard to influences outside the school, the home, the community served and stuff like that. Why would they do something so unfair to dentists? No one would ever think of doing that to schools."
I just shook my head sadly, but he had brightened. "I'm going to write my representatives and senators," he said. "I'll use the school analogy. Surely they will see the point."
He walked off with that look of hope mixed with fear and suppressed anger that I, a teacher, see in the mirror so often lately.
If you don't understand why educators resent the recent federal NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND ACT, this may help. If you do understand, you'll enjoy this analogy, which was forwarded by John S. Taylor, Superintendent of Schools for the Lancaster County, PA, School District. Be a friend to a teacher and pass this on.
Posted by GM Roper at April 6, 2007 09:17 PM | TrackBackExcellent analogy.
The rural school system where my two youngest attend is at a disadvantage to schools in middle and upper class suburbs of large cities where most parents are college educated. Quite simple really.
The other aspect of NCLB is the mainstreaming of students. My 5th grade daughter has a 4.0 GPA this year and is in Gifted and Talented classes 2-3 hours a day. The remaining classes she is with regular classes which consist of kids from the the top performers to borderline mentally retarded. These classes hinder the performance of the brighter kids.
My daughter occasionally complains about the slow pace of these classes but, sadly, had become accustomed to it. We may not be leaving the lower performing kids behind but the higher performing kids are being left out.
Posted by DADvocate at April 6, 2007 09:35 PM
Stupid analogy. If the dentist spent every day and seven hours a day with his patients, then he would have been expected to teach them something about dental care and would have helped them prevent tooth disease. It sounds as if the teachers are looking for any excuse to not have their performances measured. If they don't like the current form of measurement, then they can propose a realistic alternative--but, still accept responsibility and accountability for results.
Posted by Woody at April 7, 2007 11:04 AM
Woody, the teachers who like the accountability idea the most dislike NCLB the most. I agree on accountability, but this is classic bureaucratic rather than real accountability, finding something to measure that looks sorta related, maybe.
Posted by Assistant Village Idiot at April 7, 2007 11:44 AM
Woody...teachers aren't saying that there should be no accountability. I've NEVER heard ANY teacher say that.
What we are saying is that NCLB is not an appropriate measurement. In theory, NCLB is a wonderful idea. In actual practice, it is not working.
You show me ONE politician that would listen to, and TAKE the advice of actual 'in the trenches' teachers as to what WOULD be an appropriate and reasonable assessment and I would donate some of my hard-earned teacher pittance to his/her campaign right now!
And any dentist could spend 5 hours a day, 5 days a week (which is what I actually HAVE with my students) and then send that child home to shovel sugar by the spoonful into his mouth for 3-4 hours and not brush his teeth before he goes to bed. You're right, no damage will be done. How silly of me to think that.
Posted by Jennifer at April 7, 2007 02:43 PM
Woody, you're comment alone makes me want to break open my bag of ad hominem on you, but I will refrain. Needless to say NCLB is a joke. NCLB is a system of revenge designed by people who believe that their children are victims of a terrible educational system. It was step one in disassembling our public education system.
The parents of most of our "failing children" cannot nor will accept responsiblity for their child's education. They believe that their children are being victimized by our public education. NCLB is the result of our "not my fault" society that we are currently living in.
The backwardness of NCLB is that the onus of the passing grade is on the teacher and not the student? This makes me ask, "WHAT THE (insert your favorite colorful metaphor here)!?"
Yes there should be some accountability, but the onus of that responsiblity should lie with the student and some with the parents. Remember when we would get held back when we would not pass our classes. We were required to perform. We had to learn and there were consequences for us not performing.
Now if a teacher consistently has the majority of their class failing then they should be called to account. But requiring the teacher/ school to be responsible for a students performance is like firing a football coach because his player fumbled the ball.
Posted by psyberwolfe at April 7, 2007 03:28 PM
Jennifer, it's still a bad analogy and the weekend example that you gave is worse. Students don't go home over the weekend and forget everything that you taught them. But, you're saying that kids going home from the dentist over the weekend can lose what they had on Friday. It's just a bad comparison.
I disagree about teachers wanting accountability. The teacher's unions fight all such programs, and I haven't heard an alternative even offered. So, what we have is exactly what you would expect from a government bureaucracy and no different from public schools--poor results.
Now, what accountability program do you think should exist for teachers? How do you feel about paying teachers within the same systems different amounts based on "production?"
Posted by Woody at April 7, 2007 03:34 PM
psyberwolfe, I just caught your comment. How do you feel about vouchers where parents and their kids can select the schools that they believe produce the best results? Put competition and financial incentives into the system.
Posted by Woody at April 7, 2007 03:36 PM
I disagree that it is a bad analogy. It's not a perfect analogy, but it's fairly decent in my mind. Also, it wasn't a 'weekend' analogy of mine, it's a nightly one. Nor did I imply that everything would be undone. I did say that SOME damage would happen.
I assign approximately 20 minutes of homework a night. Usually some combination of math/reading/spelling. The homework is designed to cement what we have done during the day or to review something we've done in the past. Do you know how often my students actually DO their homework? I'm not talking all or even a majority of my students. I'm talking about the ones that NCLB was meant to serve. They don't do their homework, they AREN't taught by their parents that education and school are valuable to them and I'm expected to compete with WWF and PS3 once they get home?
I didn't say that EVERYTHING would be undone, but when the parents do not emphasize the need to complete the homework I assign, what kind of message do you think that sends the children? It tells them that I can be ignored to some degree.
What REALLY torques my hide about NCLB is NOT that it exists, but that it lays FULL responsibility on me. Not an appropriate amount of responsibility, but FULL responsibility.
My students that struggle the most are the ones that come to school sleepy because they stayed up to watch "Jeepers Creepers" with their moms last night. They didn't get their homework done because they forgot because they played PS3 all night. Why aren't parents being held accountable for that? I have a student that is currently reading 11 words per minute. The goal for 2nd graders is 90 words per minute by the end of 2nd grade. But guess what he's getting for his birthday...not a Leap Pad or some other educational toy but an XBOX! I've given up my free time to tutor him in the afternoons, and I'm not paid for that, mind you. I've bought him books about things that interest him because his parents won't/can't. But it will be ALL MY FAULT when he fails his reading test?
WHY AM I BEING THE SCAPEGOAT BECAUSE THESE PARENTS ARE NOT TAKING AN APPROPRIATE SHARE OF THE LOAD IN THEIR CHILD'S EDUCATION???
Until you get into the classroom, you have no idea.
Quite often I agree with you Woody on other subjects, but you are wrong on this one. I don't give a flying pancake about the teacher's unions. I'm not a member of one. And if politicians bend over backwards to them, then shame on the politicians.
Paying teachers for results will not give the results you want. Also, how would that work for teachers that aren't in a standardized testing level? What about the art, music and PE teachers? How can you pay them on an incentive basis?
I don't know what the answer is Woody. I've been too busy DOING my job to figure out what other teachers should be doing. But I do know that NCLB isn't the answer.
Posted by Jennifer at April 7, 2007 04:23 PM
Get him honey!!! Woody on this you are wrong. The fix requires our nation spending our defense budget on education. It requires us to pay teachers more than we pay professional athletes. You want quality education then we need to pay for it.
Posted by psyberwolfe at April 7, 2007 05:14 PM
Jennifer, you have good teachers and you have bad teachers. The bad teachers are getting a free pass and need to be identified to change or get rid of them, and the good teachers need pay commensurate with their teaching results. Someone else came up with a way to measure that. If it's wrong, then someone else can come up with another way.
psyberwolfe, please tell me that you're an 18 year-old idealist and not an adult.
Spend our defense budget on education?! Two things would happen...(1) notihing for the schools, as more money won't help, as the problem isn't money, and (2) we wouldn't have to make decisions about the schools because some foreign conqueror would be telling us what to teach--and, it sure wouldn't be Western Civ.
Pay teachers what professional athletes make?! Our system is based on supply and demand--not some ambiguous, government dictated "value." That's a dangerous concept. However, if a teacher can throw a 95 mph fastball and consistently paiint the corners of the plate, then that would be a rare teacher who could make more based on market value.
Posted by Woody at April 7, 2007 06:13 PM
Woody, bad teachers do need to be weeded out, I am with you on that 100%. However, with NCLB, teachers may be classified as 'bad' when in reality, they had a group of students that were low performers. Instead of judging teachers on one years performance, why not track the kids from one year to the next? If they made reasonable gains from the previous year, then that teacher did do a good job. If, at the beginning of 4th grade we have a low performing student who is reading on a 2nd grade level and by the end of the year is reading on a 3rd grade level, then progress has been made. That student has gained a whole year in reading skills, but that teacher will be rated as 'poor' because the student is not reading on 4th grade level. See what I mean?
Pay for performance is NOT the answer because it will never be equitable and some teachers will make the poor choice to cheat or do other things that will inflate their scores.
We get evaluated every year, it makes me wonder why the poor teachers are being offered a contract for the next year? And evaluations have been around since before NCLB.
Posted by Jennifer at April 7, 2007 07:14 PM
Woody, I love ya, but NCLB is not the battleground you want to be fighting on.
Posted by Assistant Village Idiot at April 9, 2007 08:35 PM
