While I can't find an article to support the assertion, I heard an interesting statistic on ESPN's  Mike and Mike Show this week:  Of the 18 quarterbacks taken with the first pick in the NFL draft, NONE -- including legends like Terry Bradshaw and Peyton Manning -- have led their new teams to a winning season in year one.

In fact, the BEST performance turned in by a quarterback taken with the first pick was a seven-win season.

That doesn't bode well for Andrew Luck, does it?

The Colts won TWO games last year, y'all.  Then, they lost -- or cut, or waived away -- a TON of the name-brand talent to free-agency. To make matters worse, Indianapolis enters this season with a first-time General Manager AND a first-time head coach calling the shots. 

While excitement in Indy may be higher than ever, expectations -- of
fans, of the organization, of the national sports media -- are
justifiably tempered.

No one is going to be screaming for Luck to get canned when the
Colts finish yet another disappointing season this year.  Instead, we'll
recognize the situation for what it is:  Luck -- like most football
players taken with the first pick -- is a talented player on a REALLY
crappy team.

What's more, EVERYONE who cares about the Colts will hold Indianapolis management accountable for making things BETTER for Luck in the next few years. 

The expectation will be that Colt's owner Jim Irsay will pony up serious cash to build Luck's offensive line and to surround him with a set of stars at talent positions like running back and wide receiver.  Investments will be made in the starting defense in an effort to keep games close and to give Luck more chances with the football. 

Long story short: People will expect great things from Luck, but they'll also understand that great things don't happen in a vacuum. 

If Luck struggles in an underfunded, dysfunctional system that needs to be rebuilt from the bottom up, it'll be the system -- not the star who is struggling alone against impossible circumstances -- that bears the brunt of the blame.

That's a lesson that I wish #edpolicy wonks would learn when whipping up new plans to hold teachers accountable for their performance. 

The uncomfortable truth for education's most vocal critics is that teachers struggle in the same kinds of underfunded, dysfunctional systems that Andrew Luck will face this year all of the time -- and in the face of a sluggish economy, those systems are MORE underfunded and dysfunctional than ever.

We face ever-growing class sizes as districts freeze hiring in response to budget cuts.  Those classes have more students with special learning needs than at any point in the history of the public school system, yet there are fewer special programs teachers to provide ongoing support to students in the regular education classroom. 

Professional development dollars are limited at best, leaving few opportunities for teachers to acquire the kinds of new skills necessary to adapt to ever-changing school populations.  Supplies that we once took for granted -- simple things like computers, copy paper, and colored pencils -- are few and far between.

Heck, the budget is so tight in my district that janitorial services have been cut to the quick -- which means that if I want the tile floor in my science lab to be cleaned, I've got to go find a mop and a bucket and do it myself.

Can you even IMAGINE the Colts cutting their custodial services and instead asking Andrew Luck to pick up a mop a few times a week?

#meneither

I guess what I'm trying to say is something that teachers are FINE with being held accountable for our performance when we know that we are working in systems that give us a fighting chance to succeed. 

But it's unrealistic -- not to mention unhealthy and unfair -- to point the finger at classroom teachers for the struggles of the system while simultaneously refusing to surround them with the tools that they need in order to succeed. 

#truth

_________________________________

Related Radical Reads:

Holding Teachers Accountable Ain't That Easy

What I REALLY Reject....

Barkin' Dawgs and Miserably Poor Policies

What I'd Hold YOU Accountable For

Spend any time in the professional development sessions that start every school and you're bound to come to a painful realization, y’all: Schools
– and the parents, practitioners, principals, and policymakers who support them
– have a dysfunctional relationship with answers.

“What kinds of patterns can we find in the wrong answers that students gave
on the end of grade exams?” we ask at the beginning of every school year.

“Are
certain groups and/or grade levels better at answering certain types of
questions? How should we change the way that we deliver information to ensure
that more kids get more answers right on next year’s exams?”

We dissect individual test items, looking for vocabulary words that might
have tripped students up; we try to spot teachers that seem to have discovered
the best practices for helping kids to master required content; and we worry
about what standardized testing results would say to our community about our
accomplishments.

And that bugs me. When the schooling becomes a single-minded grind to find
“the right answers,” powerful questions are pushed aside.

At the community level that means no one ever digs deep enough to figure out
just what we want our kids to learn while they’re in school.

We haven’t
collectively clarified the kinds of educational outcomes that we care about.Instead, we blindly accept the arguments of policymakers that schools are
failing and more accountability (read: public ridicule based on rankings
released after once-a-year multiple choice tests are administered) is the only
answer.

At the district level that means no one ever pushes back against practices
that few educators believe in.

“Are we REALLY convinced that standardization –
of content, of delivery, of assessments – is making our schools stronger?” is a
question that no one seems willing to ask.Instead, we accept the status quo and
do the best we can to work within a system that we KNOW is broken.

At the school level that means no one ever questions the value of the content
that we’re required to teach.

“What do we want students to know and be able to
do?” isn’t worth talking about; it’s a question that has already been answered
in daily pacing guides designed to ensure that anything that MIGHT be on the end
of grade exams is covered before June 1st.

And at the classroom level, that means no one ever dares to imagine.

Phrases
like “what would happen if” and “why should we believe in” that play a regular
role in the language of innovators and entrepreneurs are replaced with phrases
like “do you know how to” and “what do you remember about” which do nothing more
than emphasize the skills required to find the right answers to someone else’s
questions.

The simple truth is that reform just isn’t possible in organizations who have
forgotten how to ask their own questions – and sadly, that’s what education has
become.

This post originally appeared over at the Smartblogs Education site. 

As I was cleaning out my school mailbox today, I stumbled across the following mailer from Scholastic -- the ever-popular book and magazine company that serves a bajillion schools and students a year:

(click to enlarge)

Does that bother anyone besides me? 

I guess whenever I see the words "What's Important" followed by a bulleted list that STARTS with "Raise Test Scores" and ENDS with "Improve Understanding of Science Concepts," I see ANOTHER reminder of our nation's skewed #edpolicy priorities. 

What's frightening is that I'm SURE that Scholastic has done enough research to KNOW that putting "Raise Test Scores" first in their bulleted list is going to result in more opened envelopes that putting "Improve Understanding of Science Concepts" first. 

Companies of all kinds respond to their markets, y'all -- and Scholastic's figured out that educators care first-and-foremost about raising test scores. 

That should leave us feeling more than a little convicted.

#truth

___________________________

Related Radical Reads:

What DO We Want Students to Know and be able to Do?

Bulldozing the Forests

Assessing Learning the Danish Way

Poking around my feed reader on Thursday, I found a great bit on Scott McLeod's blog spotlighting two interesting quotes about value-added measures of teacher quality. 

Both came from a Diane Ravitch bit, which was in-turn sparked by an exchange happening between Anthony Cody and Vicki Phillips -- a representative of the Gates Foundation. 

My favorite quote makes a simple argument:  Organizations who argue that value-added measures of teacher quality -- which have been proven time-and-again to be flawed on a good day -- should play SOME role in teacher evaluation are doing nothing more than asking people to eat crap:

Download Slide_EatingCrap

Now don't get me wrong:  Even I think that teacher evaluation practices are fatally flawed. Check out this bit I wrote almost two years ago arguing that my own evaluations have done little to help me to improve as an educator. 

But that doesn't mean I'm ready to accept high-stakes test-driven evaluation models that do little to encourage collaboration between teachers and that force teachers to focus on the kinds of simplistic skills that we can actually test instead of the kinds of essential skills our kids will actually need to survive and thrive in tomorrow's world. 

#truth

_____________________________

Related Radical Reads:

Teacher Evaluation is Fatally Flawed

What DO We Want Students to Know and Be Able to Do?

Tested - The Price We Pay to Make the Grade

In yet another example of economists churning out crappy research that will have a negative impact on #edupolicy, Harvard professor Roland Fryer and Freakonomics co-author and University of Chicago professor Steven Levitt recently released a study touting the #edupower of "loss aversion" merit pay programs.

So what exactly do "loss aversion" merit pay programs look like in action?

read more