Teacher Exodus is a Direct Result of Accountabaloney
“We’re concerned about equity in education. You will never achieve equity by spending the few resources that you have, money, on tests. Tests don’t produce equity. They just show you that you have inequities.” -Tim Slekar
Last week, Wisconsin Public Radio released a 20 minute interview with Tim Slekar, Dean Of The School Of Education At Edgewood College, where Slekar argued the current critical teaching shortage is really a teacher exodus and test-based accountability is to blame. The interview is a “must listen.”
Slekar explored the same ideas in a recently published op-ed (urbanmilwaukee.com).
Slekar argues that calling the current crisis a “teacher shortage” is a misnomer. Teachers are leaving the profession demoralized and enrollment in teacher education is declining. He asks “who would ever design and imagine that you’re going to create the best education system in the world if you can’t even keep people in the profession let alone try to inspire more people to go into it?“
(Ahem… we’re looking at you, Florida…)
Slekar lays the blame for this “teacher exodus” on test-based accountability systems that have funneled billions of dollars away from the classroom, perpetrated a false narrative of failing public schools and placed the blame almost entirely on teachers.
Time for the hard truth. Test based accountability has done one thing well. Over the past 35 years, we have beyond any doubt, measured and confirmed the achievement gap. That’s it! Nothing else.
However, test-based accountability has destroyed the profession of teaching and caused a mass demoralization and exodus from public school classrooms. And let’s not forget about the thousands of hours of lost instruction time in the sciences, social studies, arts, music and anything else that doesn’t conform to basic literacy and numeracy skills.
It really is an insanity driven by the hatred of public schools and the greed of powerful individuals to use the false narrative of failing schools and bad teachers to drain schools of public tax dollars. Nothing done over the last 35 years in the name of accountability—Nothing! — has done anything positive for the children stuck at the bottom of the achievement gap. The problem was never failing schools and bad teachers. The problem has always been poverty born out of systemic racism.
Slekar warns continued abuse via flawed test based accountability systems will result in a continued “flooding away of teachers” and he calls on education leaders to step up and say “we’re causing more harm than we are doing good.”
Of course, the “flawed test based accountability system” Slekar warns us about is synonymous with Florida’s A+ Accountability plan, championed by Jeb Bush more than 20 years ago. Jeb’s A+ plan not only holds teachers and schools “accountable” for student test scores in a narrow range of subjects, but, also, was specifically designed to advance private school choice, offering students (from so-called “failing schools”) vouchers to attend private, mostly religious schools (where, ironically, no test-based accountability is required).
Business majors will recognize similarities between Jeb’s test-based education accountability system and Six Sigma, a once celebrated, now discredited management technique which ultimately led to the demise of Motorola and General Electric. It can be argued that Florida’s public school kids have been similarly failed by Jeb’s rush to apply business accountability to K-12 education and the Florida’s Legislature’s refusal to question its shortcomings… for 20 years…
Despite the clear detrimental impacts on our kids and our local public schools, Jeb’s flawed Accountability system remains sacrosanct. What happens to legislators who dare to criticize it? They lose their committee positions or are targeted at re-election. We cannot allow this to continue.
Tax payers need to be asking “How much money has been diverted from the class room to data companies, testing companies?” and “Why are legislators continuing to blindly support these expensive, failed accountability practices?” In Florida, the answer appears, in many cases, to be “to destroy the so-called “monopoly” of locally controlled public schools and advance the privatization of public education.” In other words: it is NOT about the kids- it will NOT improve education outcomes, it will not improve equity.
“The research is absolutely clear. Accountability doesn’t work. It will not lift poor kids out of poverty when you test them and continue to not give them food, health care and books.
It continues though to prove the teachers are failing, and then it continues the onslaught of this push on teachers to tell them how inadequate they are. To a point where I now have teachers say to me, “I’m being asked to do things, and in fact I’ve done things that are not best for kids. I’m leaving, I’m demoralized. I cannot do one more thing that will harm a kid in the name of going after some kind of closing of the achievement gap.”
This is where we’ve gotten to and so we need leaders to get to the point, and education leaders like me, particularly, getting out there. But more, political leaders, you need to stand up right now and say “End Accountability,” put the money back in the local school districts, allow teachers to make decisions about what’s best for their kids because I guarantee you, missing recess, missing gym, missing social studies and getting 20 extra minutes of reading prep for the reading test is not what’s best for kids.”
Tim Slekar “There is a Mass Teacher Exodus, Not Shortage” Wisconsin Public Radio
What does Slekar recommend in place of “accountability”? Professional Responsibility: simply put, treat teachers like professionals and expect professional responsibility. Such measures, treating teachers in high regard, he explains, are a key component of Finland’s high performing, world-class school system. Finnish teachers are well prepared, widely respected and commonly trusted professionals.
Slekar was asked, if test-based accountability were eliminated by the wave of a magic wand, how would he redirect resources to address equity issues in education? His response:
The first thing is to make sure that every kid coming to school has access to the best children’s literature available. Nothing is a better predictor of being able to learn to read when you get to school as having books in the house. Just having book available. So not one more dime under my leadership goes to testing companies…
We’ve literally spent across the entire United States, some economists say, probably $1 trillion in tests and data systems. I guarantee you that half of that money could have been spent on reducing issues — so books, food for kids, adequate after school care and adequate health care.
Then whatever is leftover goes back to the classroom for teachers, who are professionals, who have the ability to make decisions on how to best use that money to get the resources they need for their classrooms, for the individual kids in their classroom, because as the teachers of those kids, they know what those kids need. And please not one more dime on “professional development,” sponsored usually by one of the testing companies that comes in and tries to tell the teachers “you don’t know what they’re doing, do it our way and this will fix it”.
[For the record, achieving Slekar’s first step is simple: support programs like Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library in your community. Designed to foster a love of reading among preschool children, Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library is a book gifting program that mails free books to children from birth to age five in participating communities. In many areas, United Way partners with Imagination Library to ensure children grow up with books in their home. Check here to see if the program exists in your community.]
We agree with Mr. Slekar. Florida’s education leaders (superintendents, school board members, principals…) need to step up and admit our current test-focused accountability system is doing more harm than good. There are better ways (books, food for kids, adequate after school care and adequate health care) to achieve equity with our education resources.
Finally, the results are clear: test-based accountability is destroying public education. It is not a sacred cow and legislators need to stop protecting it as though it is somehow irrefutable. Lawmakers and policy influencers, from both parties, must begin to question and speak out against this flawed system that is failing our children and creating a massive teacher exodus. and if they won’t, we need to elect politicians who will.
This is not to say that Florida’s education system should have no accountability at all, just that teachers shouldn’t bear the lion’s share of the burden. As taxpayers, we should insist on an accountable use of education funding. School Districts are already held financially accountable with annual audits. Elected School Boards are held accountable at the ballot box. Non-test based models to monitor the quality of education systems already exist. In Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Britain, comprehensive school quality reviews, similar to an accreditation process, have been used to assess effectiveness of school practices. Such models can quantify quality educational outcomes and monitor for equity, without entirely relying on standardized test scores.
It is time for Florida’s lawmakers to recognize that, by refusing to question the impact of their test-focused accountabaloney, they have manufactured a teacher shortage/exodus and failed our children. If they refuse to admit their involvement, then it is time to hold them accountable.
Wow, wow, wow! The reference to Six Sigma is so on target! Finally, an education professional gets the connection.
We learned this from you, Jennifer. Thanks!
2 wonderful teachers are leaving my school this week for just these reasons. They refuse to be part of this process that blames teachers, does not help kids, and initiatives come from people who do not know the classroom. It is heart breaking to see them go, as they re both excellent teachers.