The DOE-invented credit recovery scam and how it infected my school

For more on how credit recovery has led to accelerated rates of credit accumulation, especially at the new small schools, see Jackie Bennett at EdWize.  But the practice of passing students, regardless of whether they have actually attended class or done homework, has become widespread at many, if not most, high schools throughout NYC, as schools are pressured to raise their statistics or else be threatened with closure.  Below is the account of a teacher who, for obvious reasons, would like to remain anonymous.  If other educators or parents have a story to tell about credit recovery, please email me at leonie@classsizematters.org.

At my school for the past two years my principal has been using what have become simply known as "packets" for credit recovery purposes. Apparently my principal went to a session held by the Department of Education about how to do credit recovery for students and one of the options presented was having students complete a packet of material related to the coursework to be studied.

Now, I'm not sure of the details presented to her in regards to legality (for example: seat time? Can this be a class students have never taken or just one they took but failed? Who grades these, and whose name gets attached to the grade?) but I can tell you about how it has played out in our school.

When it started it was used in very specific situations, and only for students who had so many credits to make up in their senior year that it was impossible to program them for all of them. Then it started getting worse, especially as on-track seniors were allowed to leave school early. Packets started going out right and left:

             ·         Oh, you don't want to have classes after lunch? Sure, you can have a packet for that global credit.

              ·     Oh, you don't like your science teacher? Have a packet instead. 

There seemed to be no limit. Remember, my principal didn't make this idea up; it was recommended to her by DOE officials.

And then teachers were being pressured to give half-finished, crappy packets of worksheets a passing grade. My principal was angry at the teachers who refused to grade them. It became mayhem, and I think she may have even paid teachers at another school to sign their names to some of them.

Actually, it was only through actions made by our UFT chapter that we were able to strongly suggest that this educationally damaging practice be stopped. This is another example of why having strong chapters where teachers feel protected enough to speak about egregious practices is so important. Although I guarantee that come crunch time next May and June, we will see this happening again.

The DOE wants to see graduation rates go up, especially at the new small schools that have been opened under Bloomberg, of which my school is one. They have little incentive to crack down on this type of activity, except of course in the schools they are aiming to close.

Honor a teacher-warrior on Memorial Day as well!

As much as there are military conflicts going on in Afghanistan, Libya and elsewhere, there is also a war happening right in this country, with one side armed with billions of dollars, and the other being carried out by ordinary teachers, parents, advocates and some forthright academics, the outcome of which will determine whether public education in this country will improve or will be further undermined.

We have posted a Facebook page to honor four NYC teacher warriors and winners of this year’s Class Size Matters “Skinny” awards, who have given us the real “skinny” on what is going on in our schools:  Jackie Bennett of Edwize, Julie Cavanagh of PS 15K and GEM, James Eterno of Jamaica HS, and Christine Rowland of Columbus HS.

Each of these teachers have compellingly marshaled facts and evidence in the battle to save NYC public schools.

Please contribute your own comments and/or photos about these four terrific teachers, or any others who you wish to honor. Shutterfly is going to make a book about this year’s awards, so the more comments and photos we get the better!

Past winners of the “Skinny” award, which will be given on June 15 at our annual benefit dinner, are Diane Ravitch (who is also co-hosting this year's event), Jennifer Jennings, Gary Babad, Robert Jackson, Juan Gonzalez and Norman Siegel.

Please also consider buying a ticket for the event; for more info, please click here.  Thanks!

Periodic assessments: a waste of precious time and dollars

Great piece by Jackie Bennett on the UFT blog Edwize about the so-called periodic assessments – which start next week. She says they will produce “junk data” while taking away valuable time for teaching and learning.

If you’ve ever looked at the stuff coming out of the Accountability office, you’d know there’s no one there that understands either teaching or the limits of testing.

She also says that as part of this program, “Multiple choice sheets will be picked up by courier and graded by the DoE’s vendor.”

Can you imagine the cost of this exercise in futility! Couriers picking up millions of bubbled in answer sheets in hundreds of NYC schools, and scanning them to get the results five days later – all happening five to six times per year?

Not to mention all the "Senior Achievement Facilitators" and "data inquiry teams" in each school, working overtime to analyze this junk data in order to squeeze better test scores out of our kids.

It's no wonder they're trying to steal millions of dollars from our kids’ CFE dividend to pay for this ridiculous distraction.