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[quote=Anonymous][quote]Bzzt! Wrong! It's not Arne Duncan dictating whether teachers should be getting fired for lousy results on standardized testing, it's school district administrators and principals who are doing that.[/quote]

Yes, in the end that is true.  However, Duncan is giving them tools by asking for the test scores to be used in teacher evaluations (not even "asking", "mandating").  Why would he want the test scores to be used for teacher evaluations if it is not to help administrators to fire teachers?  It's not even valid to use test scores for such a purpose (at the very least it is arguable that they are meaningful).  The one thing that Duncan is doing is incentivizing cheating on the tests (because now they are high stakes for teachers as well).  So, Duncan can look good when all the scores are coming in higher and he can say, "Look, Common Core is really working well.  The students are learning so much more."

I'm sorry to be such a cynic, but I think the tests and the federal involvement at such a micromanagement level causes these kinds of consequences, unintended or not.  When you threaten someone's pay check, you are managing them.  The teachers are not being supported by the federal government.  They are getting a very punitive message.  It doesn't matter how much "staff development" you give them (they resent that as well).  [/quote]

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