School Safety and Student Discipline
Recent teacher surveys in a number of schools have indicated a growing problem with student discipline. Practices being put in place that hold the teacher accountable for misbehavior rather than the student are causing extra work for teachers and allowing the students to control the classrooms. Costly programs like "PBIS" have created extra work for our teachers without showing any measurement of improvement in student behavior. In fact, these types of "restorative" programs were in place in Parkland Florida where a student shot up the school and killed 17. The school shooter had been an ongoing discipline problem that the administration failed to properly handle. School safety and security must be the number 1 priority! For more info on these surveys: Teacher Climate Surveys
Accountability in Grading
Recently, the VB School Board voted to abolish the esteemed awards of Valedictorian and Salutatorian. I believe that we should reward and celebrate high academic achievement just as we celebrate teacher of the year, superintendent of the year, etc. The current Board is lowering the expectations for our students rather raising the bar. If we set the bar high, students will rise to meet it. New grading practices that the Board voted to allow the Superintendent to implement, takes away personal responsibility and places more burdens on our teachers. Teachers are discourage from deducting points for work turned in late. In many schools, a zero cannot be given for work not done and retakes must be allowed until the student receives a satisfactory grade. For more information: Grading Guidelines
Teacher Morale
Teachers in our city have been contacting me about concerns that they have regarding a number of topics. Some areas of concern are:
- An overabundance of work (taking work home on evenings, weekends, and holidays)
- Being encouraged by administration to inflate grades
- Not having the authority to appropriately discipline students
- Teaching "to the test" (SOL's) and burdensome testing requirements
- Standards Based Grading at the elementary level is not effective and is lowering standards
A key problem with these issues is that teachers feel they cannot speak to the administration about their concerns for fear of reprisal. Our teachers need to be heard and action needs to be taken to address the concerns and prevent good teachers from leaving the profession. In a successful business, customers suffer if employees are not happy.
- An overabundance of work (taking work home on evenings, weekends, and holidays)
- Being encouraged by administration to inflate grades
- Not having the authority to appropriately discipline students
- Teaching "to the test" (SOL's) and burdensome testing requirements
- Standards Based Grading at the elementary level is not effective and is lowering standards
A key problem with these issues is that teachers feel they cannot speak to the administration about their concerns for fear of reprisal. Our teachers need to be heard and action needs to be taken to address the concerns and prevent good teachers from leaving the profession. In a successful business, customers suffer if employees are not happy.