Teacher Union Busting: The New Indoor Sport

Following the lead of Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker perhaps, school districts in Colorado have recently joined in the new sport of busting teacher unions ... you know, teacher unions, those powerful juggernauts of ruthless, self-serving socialists who will do anything to obtain higher salaries and shorter work days. Adams 12 School District in the north suburbs of Denver announced on Thursday that all teachers salaries would be cut 2% for the coming school year. No negotiation, no warning, just a 2% cut. According to administrators, who didn't take a cut, financial exigency demanded this reduction in expenses. Five hundred teachers took to the streets and the 10 o'clock news. No fear registered on the faces of the school board members.

Meanwhile, in the Douglas County school district the very next day, it was announced that henceforth the board would no longer negotiate with the teachers union nor pay salary to a couple of teachers who were serving as union reps or employees. Douglas County has made its reputation on and off as a leader in experimenting with merit pay for teachers.

Times are tough, ... but especially for teachers.

Gene V Glass
University of Colorado Boulder
Arizona State University

Value-Added Teacher Evaluation and Other Fairy Tales

Anyone who cares about teachers and how they are being treated in the age of Hyper-rationalized Accountability needs to view the following video that presents the results of an important research study in a manner that interested persons everywhere can understand:
ASU presents: EVAAS, Value-Added and Teacher Branding

The video presents the findings of research conducted by Audrey Amrein-Beardsley and Clarin Collins of the Mary Lou Fulton Teachers College at Arizona State University. Amrein-Beardsley and Collins's research was published this year in the journal Education Policy Analysis Archives under the title

The SAS Education Value-Added Assessment System (SAS® EVAAS®) in the Houston Independent School District (HISD): Intended and Unintended Consequences

How much longer will the fiction of value-added teacher evaluation continue to beguile politicians and even educators who should know better?

Gene V Glass
University of Colorado Boulder
Arizona State University