DC Loses Another Terrific Teacher

[Anonymous]

No my friend, everyone in the military is a basic rifleman and may be pressed into service as a grunt according to the needs of the mission at the time and I've never seen a Rambo movie.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:No my friend, everyone in the military is a basic rifleman and may be pressed into service as a grunt according to the needs of the mission at the time and I've never seen a Rambo movie.

Is this sarcasm or is there a village out there missing its idiot?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No my friend, everyone in the military is a basic rifleman and may be pressed into service as a grunt according to the needs of the mission at the time and I've never seen a Rambo movie.

Is this sarcasm or is there a village out there missing its idiot?

Yes there is - and it is you and yours.

It is inherent to the training to learn to use a rifle because you may, just may, someday have to use it. Remember what happened to Jessica Lynch? She was in the Quartermaster Corps (supply chain).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Of course I'm well aware of the location of the Killing Fields. My point: bad people exist and they will sometimes do bad things. And my point about ROTC/military service is that students shouldn't go into it just for money. The ultimate mission of the us service member is to locate, close with and kill the enemy not get money for college so you need to be aware of the ramifications of signing on the dotted line. This is the War Corps not the Peace Corps son. Once again, let me make it simple. Teaching should not be paid psychotherapy. Work out your issues on your own damn time. When you have my kid teach him/her to read write and add and subtract. Trust me, I'll handle the moral part. Riener, in his on-line letter, refers to the evaluation process as "silly and absurd." If you ask me anybody who must be ordered to put a clock in his classroom or enforce school rules and loses his job because of his petulance is silly and absurd.

A wise thing to go over with ROTC. Same with reservists etc. The reality of war footing has changed what you may be 'called upon to do' once you sign the dotted line, and even when you separate from the military (potential to be called back). People, especially young people, should go in with open eyes. Bless their hearts, many do and are ready to make this commitment.

[Anonymous]

Who's higher on the petulant and absurd scale - the teacher who won't put a clock on his wall or the principal who fires him because of it?

What's more important in that school - following minor directives of the principal or being an inspirational teacher sought after by students and their parents?

[Anonymous]

The teacher. The clock was a symptom of something deeper. I wonder if he confiscated all of his students cell phones and watches so that they couldn't tell time? Obviously he was living in some fantasy land. What I'm most interested in is hard data. I think he was sucking-up to certain parents who identified with him and I'll hazard another guess that Riener's white and the majority of his high achieving AP students were white while the majority of the mainstream students are black. You'd think a great liberal warrior would want to get down and dirty but truth be told he's just another poseur who joins the Peace Corps or the TFA people who get into teaching for the entry on the resume. Riener finally met his match. He just picked the wrong guy to screw around with. Now he's willing to return to the school to come off the bench like Brett Favre. Anyone who has taught for a long time has letters from students and parents. I just want to see the data. Should've hung that clock Joe.

[Anonymous]

As a classroom teacher, I thought his strategy was rather novel. I too hate the clock-watchers in my class who basically stop working 10 minutes before class is over.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Obviously he was living in some fantasy land.

But you're not? You've built a whole fantasy about the kind of teacher he was.

And pray tell, what does getting "down and dirty" have to do with teaching mainstream blacks?

Is it more noble to teach one type of student over another, to get down and dirty, as you put it, regardless of what a teacher's strengths are.

[Anonymous]

Riener really didn't want to get involved with the mainstream kids. This had been going on for years and the poor evaluations had also been going on for years. Time to move on and I guess he should paint the windows black and have them put cotton in their ears so they can do exactly what he did-totally block out the world.

"Is it more noble."
I guess there's some type of Socratic lesson in there someplace but you're just too smart for me. You would probably fit in perfectly in Riener's class. Perhaps you can have him convene a study group on "Finnagin's Wake" at Politics and Prose and you can sip a cup of fine Earl Grey Tea whilst Joe holds forth on the issues at hand. Good luck, I hope you get an A.

[Anonymous]

"guess there's some type of Socratic lesson in there someplace but you're just too smart for me. You would probably fit in perfectly in Riener's class. "

Thanks for the acknowledgment and the compliment. Lots of people would fit into Reiner's classes. Not everyone, but that's the way it goes in public education. kids are not widgets. Neither are teachers. Not everyone is the same.

[Anonymous]

BTW, study the Impact Evaluation, a teacher has to suck big time to fail this evaluation. It really isn't that difficult and it's obvious that any teacher who fails is either brain dead or like Col. Kurtz in "Apocalypse Now" running his own war strictly for his personal enjoyment. The fact that previous evaluations and the current evaluation correlate is further proof of professional petulance. To quote/paraphrase the late great Lloyd Bentsen; I taught with Joe Riener and you son are no Joe Riener.

[Anonymous]

FYI - Riener didn't fail, until the principal docked him points for disabling his wall clock

[Anonymous]

BTW, study the Impact Evaluation, a teacher has to suck big time to fail this evaluation.

Right, and that's the bottom line. Folks who complain about the effectiveness of IMPACT may start with some credibility, but quickly lose it when you find out just how poorly one needs to do before washing out.

It's like those who argue that the SAT is discriminatory. As composed, does it favor middle-class test takers? Yep. Is that relevant if you scored a 400? Nope.

[Anonymous]

jsteele wrote:Harry Jaffe, a Fenty sycophant and by extension, a Rhee supporter, gets a bit of a rude awakening when his daughter's teacher gets the ax:

http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/local/D_C_-loses-another-terrific-teacher-1000832-98550609.html

Not too surprising to me.

Rhee's revolational approach to public school education, like almost any revolution, began with good intention and end as regime of terror.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

BTW, study the Impact Evaluation, a teacher has to suck big time to fail this evaluation.

Right, and that's the bottom line. Folks who complain about the effectiveness of IMPACT may start with some credibility, but quickly lose it when you find out just how poorly one needs to do before washing out.

It's like those who argue that the SAT is discriminatory. As composed, does it favor middle-class test takers? Yep. Is that relevant if you scored a 400? Nope.

I'd love to see you call it 'easy' if your boss or a total stranger swung in on a vine 6 times a year with a checklist and timer to evaluate your performance. Then factored it in with 50% test scores (jury still out on whether this is a valid measurement of individual teacher performance) and 5% all school scores...
I understand that the metric may appear easy to you. I am not in the system but IMPACT appears to be so over-elaborated--almost like one of those 19th century measurement obsessed assessment and classification systems that we absolutely laugh out of the water today.