Wednesday August 29, 2012
At UTRU this week, we read the Broad Foundation’s “75 Examples of How Bureaucracy Stands in the Way of America’s Students and Teachers” and considered how these bureaucratic constraints impact UTR program and policy decisions. We have selected a few examples from the report and would love to hear your thoughts. Which issues do you feel significantly impact your effort to prepare excellent teachers for our highest need schools? How are you overcoming some of these challenges?
10. Different parts of the organization that manage resources do not communicate with each other, which means that schools and classrooms receive resources like supplies and instructional support inconsistently.
12. Principals lack the freedom to decide how to spend school dollars in ways they know would support their own students and teachers, because district central offices often control school budgets.
28. Teachers lack timely and adequate information about how each of their students is progressing. This includes data about how subgroups of students (i.e., different income, ethnic, gender, racial and language groups) are progressing on mastery of expected academic standards so that teachers can hone in on particular student needs, improve instruction and fill in gaps in the curriculum.
38. Top teachers are not properly recognized, rewarded or compensated, so they leave the profession.
43. Principals and managers are often unable to hire candidates they feel are best suited for the job because someone above has to approve the hire, or they are forced to hire teachers, like those removed from other schools, but have placement seniority and can bump other, less tenured teachers.
44. When districts have to lay off teachers due to budget cuts, they often lay off some of their best teachers because policies require the most recently hired teachers to be laid off first, rather than the least effective teachers.
45. The most challenged schools have the hardest time recruiting great teachers and teachers in specialized subjects that students desperately need, because they don’t offer attractive compensation packages, and placement isn’t always tied to student needs.
50. Some teachers’ colleges do not effectively prepare future teachers to meet modern student needs.
52. Many teachers feel frustrated because of poor workplace conditions and have little hope that things will improve.
63. Programs, policies and procedures are not consistently monitored and tested to ensure they are actually helping students and teachers improve - nor are these programs, policies and procedures abandoned when they are proven ineffective
71. Parents are unable to advocate for changes that would help their children and their school, don’t know how to navigate the system, don’t receive a response from the central office, or are told that “this is the way things are.”
75. The media focuses on a small handful of these issues, but misses the real story: entire school systems must be transformed.
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