On Thursday, Illinois, along with 15 other states and the District of Columbia, was named a finalist in the competition for $4 billion to be awarded 
through the federal Race to the Top program.
Most of the states surviving the initial review of RTTT applications, including Illinois, had applications that had been endorsed by education employees organizations. IEA supported the Illinois application.
IEA President Ken Swanson, Executive Director Audrey Soglin and General Counsel Mitch Roth, provide an update for IEA members and staff on the federal Race to the Top program and explain some of the thinking that preceded the decision to endorse the state application. Watch the video.
Illinois Education Association is an association of more than 130,000 members composed of Illinois elementary and secondary teachers, higher education faculty and staff, educational support professionals, retired educators and college students preparing to become teachers.
Shameful! Why would we endorse a law that amounts to nothing more than the political perception that Washington wants to be tough on education accountability and requires us to submit to evaluation procedures that use measures such as test scores to rate teacher performance? I have always taken pride in the fact that aside from issues related to bargaining and the work place, that IEA also stood for the quality of education for our students. RttT is a law that forces teachers to focus disproportionately on outcomes without regard for education best practices.
I feared early on the Joe’s affiliation to the IEA and now his work in DC could make us Arne Duncan’s marching army. Looks now like maybe I was right.
IEA leadership, see you on the 25th!!!!!!!!!!!!
First, Jo Anderson being at the Dept. of Ed did NOT and DOES NOT influence whether IEA engaged in the IL application for RTTT nor does it influence other IEA decisions. Decisions we make are based on IEA member interests as expressed in documents such as the Legislative Platform and the Priority One document approved at the RA last March. We looked carefully at both as we worked to influence teh state application and legislation.
The language in the new legislation does NOT mandate the use of test scores as part of the evaluation process. The language calls for the development of multiple measures of student progress as developed by the local school district and local bargaining agent. This, in fact, empowers our members and local leaders like yourself to have a real voice in how we are going to measure student growth and what measurement systems embrace best practices.
Additionally, it can be a real positive for someone to receive an evaluation which includes a clear demonstration of student growth. Such an evaluation takes away from the subjectivity an evaluator might otherwise inject into the process. Subjectivity that can be used to the detriment of the person being evaluated.
The other point I believe needs to be made is that your premise seems to suggest IEA could have taken a position of opposition to RTTT and somehow that opposition would have resulted in no new legislation. I catagorically reject that premise.
The reality, in my judgment and not mine alone, is that legislation was going to be passed without our involvement and over our opposition. In that case you might very well be dealing with performance pay componenets, no new rigor regarding evaluators (and we have been trying to address evaluator competence forever)and other misguided requirements totally detached from best practice and harmful to our members. So, I reject the premise that IEA should have just said no and we would have stopped legislation related to RTTT.
I believe members are better served than if IEA had said no and legislation with more bad and no good in it was the result.
Taking subjectivity out of the evaluation process? Evaluating teachers based on the objective? Is that the alternative that you suggest and support? How can you guarantee that test scores will not be the the determining factor use to measure student growth? Each district will negotiate their own agreement, right? If a agreement isn’t reached, we default to the state’s criteria, right? What exactly is that? Removing the subjectivity for the process removes the human element which can allow any administrator/school board to compile data to support the result that THEY want. Nice of the leadership to agree to something for us that has so many unknowns.
I’m sorry Mr. President, but you really sound like my school superintendent here and NOT the President of my union.
But I guess we’ll see how the membership feels in two weeks, right?
Jerry,
I trust our members and leaders, supported by IEA, to shape this in a way that is based on sound measures of student growth. Your presumption is that we cannot. I disagree. You seem to ignore the reality that had we not involved ourselves some of the very negative linkages you fear would have been MANDATED and passed into law by others. You have the right to live in that alternate universe if you want, but that is NOT consistent with the realities in which we find ourselves. We have to agree to disagree.