Whatever favorable reviews Joel Klein has gotten for his new book, "Lessons of Hope" have mostly been written by people who did not experience his failed policies as NYC Chancellor. If you want to read illuminating accounts, I recommend Diane Ravitch, Helen Zelon in the Observer, or Gary Rubinstein's blog, all of whom offer important reflections on Klein's record.
I could write about the tremendous waste and corruption of the many multi-million dollar contracts he handed off so recklessly, for example to Wireless Generation for ARIS and/or Future Technology Associates. I could write about his obvious mismanagement style, re-organizing the governance structure continually, creating more chaos and confusion than the steady hand the school district needed and deserved. I could also write about his evident contempt for parents, teachers, and the law itself, with one of his favorite phrases when challenged being, "So sue me."
But in the below I focus on the evidence that Klein himself would recognize as damning if he were to be intellectually consistent in his emphasis on test scores as the best measure of accountability: the fact that NYC made less progress than any other city as measured by results on the federal assessments known as the NAEPs, except for Cleveland, over the course of his administration.
I could write about the tremendous waste and corruption of the many multi-million dollar contracts he handed off so recklessly, for example to Wireless Generation for ARIS and/or Future Technology Associates. I could write about his obvious mismanagement style, re-organizing the governance structure continually, creating more chaos and confusion than the steady hand the school district needed and deserved. I could also write about his evident contempt for parents, teachers, and the law itself, with one of his favorite phrases when challenged being, "So sue me."
But in the below I focus on the evidence that Klein himself would recognize as damning if he were to be intellectually consistent in his emphasis on test scores as the best measure of accountability: the fact that NYC made less progress than any other city as measured by results on the federal assessments known as the NAEPs, except for Cleveland, over the course of his administration.
What was and is never reported is the creation of the absent teacher in reserve pool, better know as the ATR pool. These are teachers that have 10 plus years in the system and have reached their 10 year longevity bonus. 90% of these ATRs, through no fault of their own, have been sent into a demoralizing, constructive termination environment. With the soul purpose of forcing them out of the system.
ReplyDeleteJoel Klein along with mikey bloomberg have destroyed the NYC school system structure - This blog is a result from speaking with thousands of NYC educators who ALL SAY THE SAME THING - MIKEY BLOOMBERG AND JOEL KLEIN WRECKED THE NYC SCHOOL SYSTEM!!! Can everyone all feel the same way??? I could not find one NYC educator who said anything [positive about klein and bloomberg but rather all the responses were the same and that is that bloomberg and klein are a clueless as joel kleins coke bottle glasses
ReplyDeleteJOel Klein is the biggest fake you ever want to meet. This reckless goon gutted the NYC school system and created a situation of pitting people against one another in hope of creating hostile environments - Klein is evil make no mistake - this is why you will read a story just about every day about principals (put in place by klein) who treat people like shit - for no good reason and how the schools are a mess with a principal in place who has never taught in a school but rather graduated from the mike bloomberg joel klein so called "leadership academy" - now closed -
ReplyDeleteYeah I remember JOel Klein coming to my school in Queens - 2 years after that visit our school was in complete disarray with students hoarded in from rikers island - then - Klein informed us he was closing our school!!1 He is a creep in the biggest sense and would have never been chancellor if bone head #2 bloomberg put him there..blind leading blind
ReplyDeleteI am a school counselor and can honestly say bloomberg and klein have really screwed up the NYC school system. Let me explain my 2 cents:
ReplyDeleteI work as a school guidance counselor I help students with their grades including report cards, transcripts and credits required for graduation - state regents exams prep courses for students - college and career planning for students - family school meetings to address negative and positive student behaviors - structured team meetings with teachers to plan for student futures - emotional social issues for students....special education mandated students meetings which are required by state law,,graduation certification and on and on but mike bloomberg and joel klein would rather i rotate from school to school and mostly do nothing as I was excessed from my closing school. Who suffers the most from this ridiculous system,,,,,the students......sorry bloomberg klein, you got it all wrong
ReplyDeleteYou might already have heard from others too, that your blog's home page is being sabotaged by this URL:
http://x.vindicosuite.com/imp/?l=169943&t=h&u=&r=&rnd=72771973
As soon as your blog loads, the screen goes blank and the above URL automatically takes over. I cleared my machine's browsing history, cookies and cache, so I know it's not my machine. :(
Their intent was to destroy our schools opening them up to privatization!
ReplyDeleteThey placed poor excuses for school leaders and school district leaders to push that agenda.
Time to hold certain folks accountable.
ReplyDeleteCriminal charges are in order.
Farina certainly isn't a bitter, vile demagogue. She's a vast improvement over the fascist swine who immediately preceded her. But she's also a gigantic disappointment. She promotes only people who are ideologically akin to her, regardless how mediocre they are as individuals. And she automatically supports abusive principals in any conflict with any teachers, regardless of merits. The Office of Labor Relations/ Legal is as wicked as ever.
ReplyDeleteTHE ABUSIVE BEHAVIOR AGAINST TEACHERS MUST STOP
ReplyDelete