Schools for Tomorrow Blog

It looks as if Karl Rove has a new job when not working for Fox.  Check out the text of the latest radio ads playing in Denver advocating the Denver Classroom Teachers Association’s position in the contract-talks spat over ProComp.

Denver public school district officials are trying to change the nationally acclaimed performance-based pay system for Denver teachers Their proposed changes would remove incentives for experienced teachers, create quotas, and reduce accountability.
 
Call the school board and tell them to keep reform moving forward.
 
We need to attract and retain qualified teachers for Denver’s children.
 
Paid for by the Denver Classroom Teachers Association
 
Making public schools great for every child.

It’s sad to see when some who push a policy agenda rooted in deep, heartfelt compassion try to cover up the agenda’s defects with a façade of scholarly research. Such is the case with the allegedly new “Broader, Bolder” approach to education reform, and in particular the American Federation of Teachers’ so-called “evidence.”

Research guru Jay P. Greene exposes the hollow case underlying the agenda:

The Broader, Bolder folks provide a list of “background papers” to support their cause.  But those papers are very far in the background in that only a handful of the more than 100 studies cited actually assess the effects of providing students with additional services.  And even fewer look at the effects of public schools providing those services.  Before we endorse a bold new plan for education wouldn’t we want at least a few  evaluations of pilot programs in which public schools actually provided the full set of services…