Our members are never going to accept this.
— The Washington, D.C. Teachers Union Leadership on a proposed revolutionary new contract.
What actually happened:
In truth, when the union finally allowed them to vote, the teachers passed it overwhelmingly, by 80% to 20%. Given the chance to be treated as professionals and to be rewarded for their achievements, they grabbed it.
From “How to Overhaul the U.S. Education System: Michelle Rhee and Adrian Fenty on what they learned while pushing to reform D.C.’s failing public schools” in Saturday’s WSJ.
Flesh out:
We bargained with the teachers’ union for 2½ years and won significant concessions. How did we do it? By striking the sort of grand bargain that could serve as a model for other troubled school districts. The formula is really quite simple: more money and resources, in exchange for more accountability from teachers.
The union took some time to accept this trade-off. In 2008, we put a proposal on the table that we considered rather bold. In exchange for giving up tenure and linking pay to performance, teachers would be able to earn up to $130,000 a year. At first, union leadership was dead-set against it and simply refused to allow their members to vote.
We did not give up that easily. D.C. went for more than two years without a new teachers’ contract, but we kept at it. Since the city did not have the money for a significant raise, we implored several foundations to consider providing the resources to enact a groundbreaking contract. The funders, including the Broad Foundation and the Walton Family Foundation, were clear that they would put up the money, but not if they were only backing a marginal improvement. The contract had to set a new precedent.
That D.C.’s teachers finally endorsed this revolutionary new contract shows that they, too, are ready for change. When we were negotiating with the union, we heard one thing over and over again from the leadership: “Our members are never going to accept this.” In truth, when the union finally allowed them to vote, the teachers passed it overwhelmingly, by 80% to 20%. Given the chance to be treated as professionals and to be rewarded for their achievements, they grabbed it.
Our contract with the teachers achieved a number of breakthroughs:
• It rewards great teachers who accept a higher level of accountability with some of the highest teacher pay in the nation—up to twice as much as they were previously making.
• No longer do educators have a job guarantee for life. Ineffective teachers are immediately dismissed from the system. Minimally effective teachers do not receive a pay step increase and have one year to improve their performance. If that doesn’t happen, they are subject to termination.
• If layoffs are necessary, the decisions about whom to dismiss are based on quality and performance instead of seniority.
• We also instituted a comprehensive system for evaluating teachers, including growth in student achievement as measured by standardized tests (so that teachers who take on the toughest students aren’t unfairly penalized), observation of their classroom practices and assessment of their contributions to the school community.
Read the entire piece, including some initial results, here.
Progress.
Ooh — more from Christie today
If 7 out of 10 of your bosses disapproved of your work, wouldn’t you be fired, too?
Own it, incumbents.
Real Clear Politics Average: Congressional Job Approval (Polling Data from 9/28 -10/18)
Previously:
Chicago Mayor Daley Threatens to Shoot Reporter, Embarrases Himself, City
So I asked: since guns are readily available in Chicago even with a ban in place, do you really think it’s been effective?
I’m hardly the only guy who asks the mayor things he doesn’t want to answer, and I’ve been responsible for at least one of his huffing, puffing, ranting tangents, which generally get the press corps laughing, thus enabling him to move on to the next question without giving a real answer to the one at hand.
But even by those standards, this was a masterful and surreal performance.
“Oh!” Daley said. “It’s been very effective!”
He grabbed a rifle, held it up, and looked right at me. He was chuckling but there was no smile.
“If I put this up your—ha!—your butt—ha ha!—you’ll find out how effective this is!”
For a moment the room was very, very quiet. I took a good look at the weapon. It had a long bayonet. (Was it seized during the Civil War?)
“If I put a round up your—ha ha!”
The photographers snapped away. Suddenly everybody started cracking up.
Read reporter Mick Dumke’s account here.
Video here.
What a great sense of humor!
Moron.
Of course I pay attention to ratings…and simply put, the ratings for my program are not where I would like them to be. It is largely for this reason that I am stepping down as anchor of CNN’s ‘Campbell Brown.’
To be clear: this is my decision, and one that I have been thinking about for some time. As for why, I could have said, that I am stepping down to spend more time with my children (which I truly want to do). Or that I am leaving to pursue other opportunities (which I also truly want to do). But I have never had much tolerance for others’ spin, so I can’t imagine trying to stomach my own. The simple fact is that not enough people want to watch my program, and I owe it to myself and to CNN to get out of the way so that CNN can try something else.
Campbell Brown, announcing she is voluntarily leaving the CNN show that bears her name.
Classy move.
Accountability is sexy and admirable.
Don’t see it enough these days in the public sphere.
“Come senators, congressmen, please heed the call…”
ABC: New Government Study Has Good News, Bad News, for Senate Democrats' Health Care Bill
Just the bad news:
Some bad news: The cost curve is still bending in the wrong direction.
The study says: “Overall national health expenditures under this bill would increase by an estimated total of $222 billion (0.6 percent) during calendar years 2010-2019.”
The estimated effects of the bill on overall national health expenditures is that the share of GDP is projected to be 20.9 percent in 2019 compared to 20.8 under current law — “primarily as a net result of the substantial expansions in coverage.”
Also: the expansion of Medicaid to an additional 18 million people might be tough to achieve; “it is reasonable to expect that a significant portion of the increased demand for Medicaid would be difficult to meet, particularly over the first few years.”
And, “the additional demand for health services could be difficult to meet initially with existing health provider resources and could lead to price increases, cost-shifting, and/or changes in providers’ willingness to treat patients with low-reimbursement health coverage.”
Additionally, as was CBO, CMS is skeptical that there would be savings from Medicare.
To wit: “Reductions in payment updates to health care providers, based on economy-wide productivity gains, are unlikely to be sustainable on a permanent basis. If these reductions were to prove unworkable within the 10-year period 2010-2019 (as appears probable for significant numbers of hospitals, skilled nursing facilities, and home health agencies), then the actual Medicare savings from these provisions would be less than shown in then memorandum. Similarly, the further reductions in Medicare growth rates mandated for 2015 through 2019 through the Independent Payment Advisory Board may be difficult to achieve in practice.”
The “providers for whom Medicare constitutes a substantive portion of their business could find it difficult to remain profitable and, absent legislative intervention, might end their participation in the program (possibly jeopardizing access to care for beneficiaries).”
Should the bill(s) pass in its current form, I’m going to bookmark this article and add an entry to my calendar 5 and 10 years from today to see if we’re at all on track.
Click through for the rest of the article.
