demoralized in MCPS

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I can't believe no one pushes back. I've been in two high schools since SLOs were introduced. Behind closed doors, we would always ask, "Who looks at them?"

The only reason we have them is to avoid connecting test data to evaluations. Both scenarios are a joke. But we go through the motions b/c someone who 1) taught eons ago or 2) never taught or 3) taught for a hot second knows better than we do.

I can't believe savvy teachers would fall for this crap.

Do you push back? What does that look like other than asking questions behind closed doors?

We use the same SLO as a team. "Data" captured is BS. We don't worry about it. After it's filed away, no one looks at it. I have YET to be called on my SLO results,and I've been doing this job for over two decades.

Pushing back for this stupid add on - to justify someone's job - means doing very little with it.

I agree. Before SLOs there were PDPs and some other one I forget the acronym for. It’s a joke for those of us who work in schools with transient populations. I think there are one or two kids left from my subgroup of 6 identified at the beginning of the year. We have kids moving in and out all year long so it’s basically a piece of paper used to justify some central office person’s job. They will get rid of SLOs in a few years in favor of some other acronym.

PDPs and SLOs have very different purposes and executions.

PDP is what training you are doing to expand your toolkit of your own knowledge and skills. “I will become conversant in Spanish to support my ESOL 1 students.” SLO is the specific learning objectives and strategies you have for a subset of students. “My Hispanic male ESOL students will be able to write a complete sentence in English without support 4 out of 5 times.

PDP is over the course of several years. SLO is a semester or a year tops.

PDPs? I haven't done one of those in years!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I can't believe no one pushes back. I've been in two high schools since SLOs were introduced. Behind closed doors, we would always ask, "Who looks at them?"

The only reason we have them is to avoid connecting test data to evaluations. Both scenarios are a joke. But we go through the motions b/c someone who 1) taught eons ago or 2) never taught or 3) taught for a hot second knows better than we do.

I can't believe savvy teachers would fall for this crap.

Do you push back? What does that look like other than asking questions behind closed doors?

We use the same SLO as a team. "Data" captured is BS. We don't worry about it. After it's filed away, no one looks at it. I have YET to be called on my SLO results,and I've been doing this job for over two decades.

Pushing back for this stupid add on - to justify someone's job - means doing very little with it.

I agree. Before SLOs there were PDPs and some other one I forget the acronym for. It’s a joke for those of us who work in schools with transient populations. I think there are one or two kids left from my subgroup of 6 identified at the beginning of the year. We have kids moving in and out all year long so it’s basically a piece of paper used to justify some central office person’s job. They will get rid of SLOs in a few years in favor of some other acronym.

PDPs and SLOs have very different purposes and executions.

PDP is what training you are doing to expand your toolkit of your own knowledge and skills. “I will become conversant in Spanish to support my ESOL 1 students.” SLO is the specific learning objectives and strategies you have for a subset of students. “My Hispanic male ESOL students will be able to write a complete sentence in English without support 4 out of 5 times.

PDP is over the course of several years. SLO is a semester or a year tops.

PDPs? I haven't done one of those in years!

Exactly. If they were actually valuable then we’d still be doing them. We’ll say the same thing about SLOs in a few years once some central office employee comes up with a new acronym to justify their salary. I think it’s funny that the poster responded to explain the difference as if we didn’t know what they were. We know what they are—it doesn’t mean that they’re at all meaningful or effective.

[Anonymous]

You could make up the info on the spot. It's what your administrators want anyway. Only suckers take it seriously. We got tenure bitches!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You could make up the info on the spot. It's what your administrators want anyway. Only suckers take it seriously. We got tenure bitches!

There’s a huge teacher shortage, everyone. Push back. Lose the fear!

[Anonymous]

Comments like these last three pages are why people don’t respect teachers.

[Anonymous]

I think it was meant to be ironic because they are going to pressure you to inflate anyway exemplified by -put your name on the top and get 50%, and unlimited retakes (to the point that the teacher runs out of time they budgeted for), the apathy toward cheating rules, cell phone copying, pbis aversion to consequences etc. If the system wants skewed facts and skewed mathematics, what good is quantifying anything and further what good is analyzing data that has so much error in the first place it has no significance besides the fact of it's own unreliability and bias to follow an unreflective path. If all these points have an ounce of truth (overwhelmingly they do) then the punative system that is hacking teachers is inherently flawed. In a war on education teachers must fight virtuously and not give up to the university industrial complex of corrupt profits and pseudoeducation.

[Anonymous]

Teachers already don't have time and have to work 2 and three jobs to make ends meet. Corners need to be cut for professional survival by getting to the ends that your admin needs to be successful. We have a system where one hand washes the other whether it's "right" or not. What is right is keeping your income by any means necessary and if that means playing ball with the status quo, rug undersweeping, Turning blind eyes, whatever necessary to keep food in your kids stomachs, you get the picture. It isn't ideal and it's not going to improve behavior, study habits, morale, or standardized test results but they system is so disgustingly broken maybe degredation of knowledge and inquiry is just what is needed to sell current public Ed systems to the next generation. And the logic of celebrated incompetence comes full circle. Thank you!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Teachers already don't have time and have to work 2 and three jobs to make ends meet. Corners need to be cut for professional survival by getting to the ends that your admin needs to be successful. We have a system where one hand washes the other whether it's "right" or not. What is right is keeping your income by any means necessary and if that means playing ball with the status quo, rug undersweeping, Turning blind eyes, whatever necessary to keep food in your kids stomachs, you get the picture. It isn't ideal and it's not going to improve behavior, study habits, morale, or standardized test results but they system is so disgustingly broken maybe degredation of knowledge and inquiry is just what is needed to sell current public Ed systems to the next generation. And the logic of celebrated incompetence comes full circle. Thank you!

Cutting corners is morally indefensible. I can put food in my kids’ bellies without depriving other people’s kids’ of a decent education.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Comments like these last three pages are why people don’t respect teachers.

Well, shortly there won't be enough teachers to trash thanks to comments like yours.

lol - Keep it up. Soon you'll be forced to homeschool or take out loans to pay for private.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You could make up the info on the spot. It's what your administrators want anyway. Only suckers take it seriously. We got tenure bitches!

There’s a huge teacher shortage, everyone. Push back. Lose the fear!

This is true.

Has anyone checked out careers lately? There are so many articles on teacher attrition, but apparently the general public prefers to ignore these alarming stats.

[Anonymous]

this is the first week in ten years i have seriously thought about leaving teaching. Been in the teaching for 20 years in several countries and local counties in MD.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Comments like these last three pages are why people don’t respect teachers.

Well, shortly there won't be enough teachers to trash thanks to comments like yours.

lol - Keep it up. Soon you'll be forced to homeschool or take out loans to pay for private.

Actually, I’m a veteran teacher. Really embarrassed that you call yourself a teacher.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I can't believe no one pushes back. I've been in two high schools since SLOs were introduced. Behind closed doors, we would always ask, "Who looks at them?"

The only reason we have them is to avoid connecting test data to evaluations. Both scenarios are a joke. But we go through the motions b/c someone who 1) taught eons ago or 2) never taught or 3) taught for a hot second knows better than we do.

I can't believe savvy teachers would fall for this crap.

Do you push back? What does that look like other than asking questions behind closed doors?

We use the same SLO as a team. "Data" captured is BS. We don't worry about it. After it's filed away, no one looks at it. I have YET to be called on my SLO results,and I've been doing this job for over two decades.

Pushing back for this stupid add on - to justify someone's job - means doing very little with it.

I agree. Before SLOs there were PDPs and some other one I forget the acronym for. It’s a joke for those of us who work in schools with transient populations. I think there are one or two kids left from my subgroup of 6 identified at the beginning of the year. We have kids moving in and out all year long so it’s basically a piece of paper used to justify some central office person’s job. They will get rid of SLOs in a few years in favor of some other acronym.

PDPs and SLOs have very different purposes and executions.

PDP is what training you are doing to expand your toolkit of your own knowledge and skills. “I will become conversant in Spanish to support my ESOL 1 students.” SLO is the specific learning objectives and strategies you have for a subset of students. “My Hispanic male ESOL students will be able to write a complete sentence in English without support 4 out of 5 times.

PDP is over the course of several years. SLO is a semester or a year tops.

PDPs? I haven't done one of those in years!

Exactly. If they were actually valuable then we’d still be doing them. We’ll say the same thing about SLOs in a few years once some central office employee comes up with a new acronym to justify their salary. I think it’s funny that the poster responded to explain the difference as if we didn’t know what they were. We know what they are—it doesn’t mean that they’re at all meaningful or effective.

I’m deeply concerned that you don’t know that SLOs are a state of Maryland requirement.

That’s right, not invented by MCPS.

Your colleagues in two dozen districts have to complete them, but you think they will poof and disappear if MCPS no longer wants them. We had visitors from the state dept of Ed three times this year and all three times, they referenced our SLOs and asked to see how we were designing and implementing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Comments like these last three pages are why people don’t respect teachers.

Well, shortly there won't be enough teachers to trash thanks to comments like yours.

lol - Keep it up. Soon you'll be forced to homeschool or take out loans to pay for private.

Actually, I’m a veteran teacher. Really embarrassed that you call yourself a teacher.

Define veteran, hon. My team leader is a "veteran" with five years in. laughable in my book

And for the record, I have nothing about which to be embarrassed.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I can't believe no one pushes back. I've been in two high schools since SLOs were introduced. Behind closed doors, we would always ask, "Who looks at them?"

The only reason we have them is to avoid connecting test data to evaluations. Both scenarios are a joke. But we go through the motions b/c someone who 1) taught eons ago or 2) never taught or 3) taught for a hot second knows better than we do.

I can't believe savvy teachers would fall for this crap.

Do you push back? What does that look like other than asking questions behind closed doors?

We use the same SLO as a team. "Data" captured is BS. We don't worry about it. After it's filed away, no one looks at it. I have YET to be called on my SLO results,and I've been doing this job for over two decades.

Pushing back for this stupid add on - to justify someone's job - means doing very little with it.

I agree. Before SLOs there were PDPs and some other one I forget the acronym for. It’s a joke for those of us who work in schools with transient populations. I think there are one or two kids left from my subgroup of 6 identified at the beginning of the year. We have kids moving in and out all year long so it’s basically a piece of paper used to justify some central office person’s job. They will get rid of SLOs in a few years in favor of some other acronym.

PDPs and SLOs have very different purposes and executions.

PDP is what training you are doing to expand your toolkit of your own knowledge and skills. “I will become conversant in Spanish to support my ESOL 1 students.” SLO is the specific learning objectives and strategies you have for a subset of students. “My Hispanic male ESOL students will be able to write a complete sentence in English without support 4 out of 5 times.

PDP is over the course of several years. SLO is a semester or a year tops.

PDPs? I haven't done one of those in years!

Exactly. If they were actually valuable then we’d still be doing them. We’ll say the same thing about SLOs in a few years once some central office employee comes up with a new acronym to justify their salary. I think it’s funny that the poster responded to explain the difference as if we didn’t know what they were. We know what they are—it doesn’t mean that they’re at all meaningful or effective.

I’m deeply concerned that you don’t know that SLOs are a state of Maryland requirement.

That’s right, not invented by MCPS.

Your colleagues in two dozen districts have to complete them, but you think they will poof and disappear if MCPS no longer wants them. We had visitors from the state dept of Ed three times this year and all three times, they referenced our SLOs and asked to see how we were designing and implementing.

Why are you so passionate about that BS?

Yes, many of us know SLOs were a trade off. refusing to use test scores as part of your evaluation? Here's a SLO!

So who cares how they came about? They are useless slips of paper that amount to nothing.