Bricks Without Straw Part II

Data gathering...on a normal day, attendance is taken and loaded online by 10 am. Students who miss school on a regular basis receive a series of attendance letters. Letters 1, 2, 3 and 4 are sent to parents and with this 4th and final letter comes a PINS reference (person in need of supervision). Everything goes downtown to Central Office and the PINS information goes to Child Protective Services. The child is then watched or tracked, but in many cases...nothing ever happens to end the truency. One child in our school missed the first eight days of school this year. This child missed 40 days his/her first year of school, 50 days the second year, and 20 days the third year. Another student missed three full weeks of school last month and now attends irregularly. A common sense question might be posed at this point. What was the purpose of all those letters for these two children? Why bother to report this to anyone? Nothing happens. It seems that an awful lot of paperwork is generated for nothing to happen. The paper trail often leads nowhere.

Data gathering...Child Protective Services is an overworked agency and no doubt those who work in CPS are well intentioned and motivated to change the lives of these children for the better. However, CPS workers do not always meet with teachers. Teachers are mandated reporters and of any group, often have the most thorough knowledge of a child. Teachers track children for a number of years. They know that a child needs glasses and they know family members. They know who is in jail and who has been released. They know who has what allergy and who has diabetes and who is underwashed and over hungry and who has chronic head lice. Teachers know important things! Teachers document everything with emails and communicate with parent liasons, Central Office personnel and nursing staff. Teachers are frustrated when they deal with stacks of paper and documentation and speak to many people and observe that when the shuffle is all over and the dust and feathers settle...nothing happens. Personal knowledge and common sense are apparently not enough to be considered part of the solution. So the little girl with the black eye stays home a few days...and returns. The child who is profoundly emotionally disturbed comes back to the classroom and sleeps the day away while the teacher exhausts every measure to get him/her into day treatment. Paper trails begin almost daily...and end with???

Data gathering...for field trips, there is a three page permission letter for parents to fill out EACH time. Each time there may be new phone numbers, new addresses, new information about doctors and new information about who may or may not pick up the child. When paperwork is not returned, the children are left in other classrooms for the day, unable to attend the field trip.

Data gathering...report cards are completed four times a year and appear to be subjective. What does it mean when a student "talks about books"? How does one measure that empirically? Report cards attempt to measure things such as..."reads every day" or "writes every day". How vague! Reads what every day? Writes what every day? And does that reading indicate a thorough mastery and comprehension of the topic? Is the student simply de-coding? Is the student writing well? Do we consider penmanship? Grammar? Paragraph indentation? Good cognitive processing? Fluency? Logic? Is it in English only? Is it in Spanish only? Is it in both languages? What if a child reads an appropriate level book for his or her grade...say a B level book...but it is now June and the child is meant to be reading at a level M or higher? Is it an appropriate book? Yes. Does it meet the standard? No.

Consider this...there are 72 entries on a second grade report card. Some second graders can't count to 72. All of this report card information is entered online and the district system does not always mesh with home computers. The teacher either stays in the school building until late hours...or heads off to the various university libraries to use their computers and printers...until late hours. 72 entries? Really?

Data gathering...a teacher fills out large numbers of office referrals for students who need to be removed from the classroom and sent to the office or the ATS (alternative to suspension) room. There are no real consequences for bad behavior. Students who end up in the ATS room come with work that the teacher has sent, but no real instruction happens. They are babysat. There are numerous phone calls home. Many phones are disconnected. Notes are sent home. Notes are ignored. Parent liaisons visit homes. Social workers talk to students and families. Students return. Bad behavior continues. But data has been gathered!

Data gathering...DRA's (running reading records) occur three times annually. They are entered on paper and online. There are Terra Nova (district) tests given annually. AIS plans are due 4 times a year. There are IEPs to be written. There is ESOL testing in April, (testing for students who are not English speakers in the areas of listening, speaking, writing and reading). The ELA exam begins in third grade and is given annually. There are teacher generated tests for material which is supposed to be covered during the year. New teachers are required to manage and keep certification by completing 175 professional development hours every 5 years. A district computer system can drop grades and enter information incorrectly. The teacher I interviewed estimated that he/she spends anywhere from 8-15 hours weekly on paperwork...both academic and non-academic. Data is gathered but is anything learned?

Can the reader understand how the idea of merit pay for teachers might be controversial? How would a teacher prove merit? How would a teacher be able to defend him/herself when after having taught all the material he/she was still unable to get children to move onto the next grade because they were absent fifty times? Or they missed tests? Or they moved two or three times? Or they spent numerous days in the ATS room with no instruction? Or they were beaten up over the weekend? How would merit be evaluated? Let me suggest that it would undoubtedly involve more paperwork...and data gathering.