Automating Instruction Isn't What Works: Grading the Digital School Inflating the Software Report Card

Another interesting irony: closed or hidden bidding on committing millions of public dollars to digitizing public education; yet the record does not suggest that this is money well-spent.

Grading the Digital School: Inflating the Software Report Card
By TRIP GABRIEL and MATT RICHTEL; Published: October 8, 2011

The Web site of Carnegie Learning, a company started by scientists at Carnegie Mellon University that sells classroom software, trumpets this promise: “Revolutionary Math Curricula. Revolutionary Results.”
T. Lynne Pixley for The New York Times

In Augusta, Ga., the school district has expanded the use of Cognitive Tutor math software to all of its high school students.
Grading the Digital School Unfulfilled Promises
Articles in this series will look at the intersection of education, technology and business as schools embrace digital learning.

Grading the Digital School: In Classroom of Future, Stagnant Scores (September 4, 2011)

The pitch has sounded seductive to thousands of schools across the country for more than a decade. But a review by the United States Department of Education last year would suggest a much less alluring come-on: Undistinguished math curricula. Unproven results.

. . . .

Many companies ignore well-regarded independent studies that test their products’ effectiveness. Carnegie’s Web site, for example, makes no mention of the 2010 review, by the Education Department’s What Works Clearinghouse, which analyzed 24 studies of Cognitive Tutor’s effectiveness but found that only four of those met high research standards. Some firms misrepresent research by cherry-picking results and promote surveys or limited case studies that lack the scientific rigor required by the clearinghouse and other authorities.

. . . .

Carnegie, one of the most respected of the educational software firms, is hardly alone in overpromising or misleading.

[Funny, a company is among the most respected, yet it can overpromise or mislead --Ed.]

. . . .
And Intel, in a Web document urging schools to buy computers for every student, acknowledges that “there are no longitudinal, randomized trials linking eLearning to positive learning outcomes.”

Follow the rest of the article at the Times' main site.

More Corporate Fronts Behind Education "Reform" Exposed

Behind every education "reform" (actually, deform) group is a millionaire investor or donor. We've heard about the Broad and the Gates foundations manipulating public education policy. Here is more unsettling news of meddling 1%er families in the same vein.

Behind Education Action Group is Mackinac Center for Public Policy and the DeVos family of multi-level marketer Amway fame. (Wikipedia describes the Mackinac Center as: The Mackinac Center for Public Policy is a free market think tank headquartered in Midland, Michigan. It is the USA’s largest state-based free market think tank.)
(And see Right Wing Watch about the Mackinac Center: http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/mackinac-center-public-policy
From the madfloridian blog (in democraticunderground.com):

As with the earlier Tempers Flaring in Memphis article, the following is from the madfloridian post, the indents are from the inset boxes throughout the article.

Another "false front" education reform group? Keep eye out for their op eds in local papers.
Posted by madfloridian in General Discussion
Sun Oct 09th 2011, 12:55 PM
The Michigan Education Association writes about the Education Action Group and warns to watch out for their activities.

Behind the false front

Note the ties to the Mackinac Center and the DeVos family.

EAG isn’t really a group. It’s two very partisan men with ties to the Mackinac Center for Public Policy and Dick DeVos of Amway Corp. fame. Olson’s brother is director of education policy at the Mackinac Center, another anti-union, pro-privatization group. The man who incorporated EAG, Eric Doster, is a Michigan Republican Party lawyer who has served on the board of the Great Lakes Education Project, a political action committee linked to DeVos. DeVos, of course, helped finance the failed 2000 vouchers initiative.

EAG bashes the collective bargaining process and school employees’ rights to inform the community and to work to elect leaders who value students and the employees who teach and help them at school.

Olson claims to be nonpartisan, but he is a partisan Republican Party activist and an officer in the state party.

Olson refuses to disclose his group’s funding sources, making it difficult to discern whose agenda EAG is pushing.

This Michigan-based "reformer" group just had an opinion piece published in the Tampa Tribune. It is anti teachers unions.

Teachers' union seeks to nullify the public's will

The column refers to an effort by the teachers' union in Florida to fight the new anti-tenure law. They totally mispresent what the situation is about, and then they go on to express support for Rick Scott's extreme education changes.

By filing this suit, union leaders are telling people that teachers should not be held accountable for the performance of their students. They want us to believe all teachers are equally intelligent and motivated. They're saying that all teachers should continue to have a guaranteed job for life under tenure and remain on a common pay scale, regardless of the outcome of their work.

More than anything, FEA leaders are blatantly displaying their disrespect for the democratic process. They have no interest in the outcome of the elections that put Scott and his legislative allies in office. They are willing to use the courts to overturn the will of the people.

So much for majority rule. Union leaders, with all their wealth and influence, can simply shop for a politically-friendly judge who will rule in their favor. The eventual ruling may have little to do with the constitutionality of the new law and more to do with judges who accept donations from the teachers' union and feel obliged to pay them back.

And they speak of Rick Scott:

Reform-minded leaders like Scott have stood up to the unions and demanded accountability in the classroom. If teachers are not going to be held responsible for student performance, who will be? Can you think of another profession where employees are not held accountable for the final product?

They simply are not telling the truth. I wonder how many op eds in how many newspapers?

One member of this group has been regularly hounding an education blogger these last few months. They demanded and got all his education emails. The blogger, Fred Klonsky, posted about it often at his blog.

The return of Velderman. Ask GOP tough questions and you get put on a watch list.

It was late last school year that the goof ball ideological terrorists at the Michigan-based Education Action Group demanded that my school district hand over to them all my work emails.

Which they did.

EAG gofer Ben Velderman signed the FOIA request. The reason for the FOIA was that this blog asks tough questions about education and public policy and is outspokenly pro-teacher and pro-union.

Nothing has changed about that. Certainly not a FOIA request from some punk from EAG.

Now Think Progress reports that this is becoming standard GOP practice. Ask a Republican elected official a challenging question and you get placed on a watch list.

There are many of these groups which are fronts for corporations. One of them that is doing great harm to public schools is called the Parents Revolution. It is no parents revolution, it is funded by billionaires, connected to Green Dot charter schools.

The MEA website says this EAG group has tactics that "include sending anti-union mail to residents, attending local school board meetings and using the news media to further its negative agenda."

They also recommend:

If EAG surfaces in your district, please inform your local MEA UniServ director. You also may want to share what you know about EAG with your school board members and administrators, so they can consider EAG’s motives.

Maybe I should let them know it is surfacing in Tampa, Florida.

Most Americans approve of local schools : Poll shows

Given the war against public schools from Barack Obama and Arne Duncan to Chris Christie, this is ironic news. So, what gives with the mania to attack teachers?

Most Americans approve of local schools : Poll shows
By James Campbell, on August 17, 2011, at 8:11 am
USA TODAY

By Greg Toppo

A new survey finds that more Americans today like their kids’ public schools than at any time in the past 36 years — even though they believe U.S. education in general has taken a bit of a dive.

Nearly eight in 10 Americans — 79% — give an “A or B” grade to the school their oldest child attends, according to findings released today by Phi Delta Kappa (PDK) International, an educators association. That’s up from 68% in 2001, and the highest percentage of favorable ratings since PDK began asking the question in 1985. That year, 71% of parents gave their kids’ school top grades.But since 2001, Americans have soured on schools in general: When 1,002 adults were asked June 4-13 to give a letter grade to ”public schools in the nation as a whole,” only 17% gave them an A or B, down from 23% in 2001, and 27% in 1985.The survey is part of broader findings released annually by PDK, which has been polling the public on education trends since the mid-1970s.
Bill Bushaw, the group’s executive director, says the split is the most curious finding. He said parents’ increased liking of their child’s school may be a sign that people are more in tune with local schools’ efforts at educational reform.”I think they see the things that schools are attempting to do to transform,” Bushaw said. Mike Petrilli of the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, a Washington, D.C., education think tank, says there’s evidence that many U.S. public schools are improving. But he says parents’ willingness to like their child’s school may stem from a kind of guilt — especially if parents can afford to pay for a private school or have moved to a neighborhood with higher-performing schools.”Who’s going to give their kid’s school a low grade unless they’re poor and they’re trapped?” he says. “There’d just be too much cognitive dissonance to admit that your child’s school” isn’t up to par. The overall drop in opinion of U.S. schools coincides with reports that the quality of schools in the USA is slipping compared to other nations.

Tempers Flare at Jobs Fair as Experienced Teachers Told No Jobs

Memphis surplus teachers crisis instigated by policies of U.S. Education Secretary Arne Dancan
Published verbatim from democraticunderground. Indents are article excerpts that the original post cited. Article excerpts have been broadened to include full articles or letters cited. {Bracketed parts} are from this blogger.

"Gee, Arne. How do you feel about the tempers flaring at the Memphis schools job fair?" {From 10/7 post at democraticunderground, which drew from the "Memphis Commercial Appeal."}

This is your education reform in action, Arne Duncan. Does it make you proud to see all those long-time teachers in their 50s unable to get jobs after devoting themselves to their careers?

I hope they do file those age-discrimination lawsuits..I will be among the first to offer financial support.

They are being laid off and replaced by trainees from TFA. Yes, this is your reform in action. Proud of it, are you?

Tempers boil over at Memphis City Schools job fair, "Commercial-Appeal" news story link.

Police were called to calm a disturbance at a Memphis City Schools job fair Friday when about 70 experienced teachers were told there were no openings.

"When I heard that, I turned around and told all the teachers in the auditorium that we need to file a class-action suit," said Dennis Paden, 54, an 18-year classroom veteran with a master's degree.

"Most of the teachers, if not all, were over 50. Several were in wheelchairs. It's a classic case of age discrimination," said Paden, who was told to leave the fair at American Way Middle because he was causing a disturbance and being belligerent.

....Teachers said the flare-up reflects anger over changes that allow the district to hire new teachers over senior staff to help meet "curriculum needs."


One of the comments after the article hits the nail on the head.

"As a result of the teacher shuffling, all sections of physics at Ridgeway High were dissolved this week ... Students were told Friday, a week before the quarter ends, that physics classes would no longer meet."

Ridgeway, isn't that supposed to be one of the better schools in the MCS?

How could an accredited high school not offer Physics? Isn't that sort of like educational malpractice?

As for Dennis Paden, I'd have him teaching my children any day. We can use passionate, interesting history teachers out in the new suburban schools. We could also use someone like him at my children's private school (that is within about a 10-minute drive of his home).


Who's Dennis Paden? Here's his letter today about being treated disrespectfully and being without a job in spite of glowing references. He says the superintendent calls them "lemons:"

Letter: "MCS mistakes prove costly," from the Commercial Appeal today:

I am one of the many Memphis City Schools teachers whose official status is "surplus teacher." Supt. Kriner Cash derisively refers to us as "lemons." For him, it may be a joke. For cash-strapped taxpayers it is no laughing matter. By my conservative estimate, his misuse of resources will cost you in excess of $6 million.

Last year I taught advanced placement U.S. history, African-American history, economics, U.S. government and two regular sections of United States history. My other duties included coaching the debate team and serving as head coach for our varsity baseball program. It was a grueling schedule that I accepted as a professional challenge. I did not complain. I was proud to be a team player. At the end of the year when my principal told me that my A.P. class would be discontinued and that as a result of other staffing cuts he needed my slot to hire a football coach, I was stunned. I was placed on the surplus list and have yet to be hired at another school despite glowing recommendations, a master's degree in my subject area and a résumé packed with career experience in virtually every area related to the social sciences. My evaluations contain no deficiencies.

Being a vocal critic of reforms that too often label children, teachers and schools as failures as a result of high-stakes testing, I can understand how I may have rubbed some the wrong way. However, when I meet with other teachers in surplus status, I find they too are highly qualified and were solid contributors in their last assignment. So, what gives?

It is curious to me why so many veteran teachers have been relegated to the sidelines in exchange for less experienced and, in most cases, less qualified Teach For America personnel. According to Deputy Supt. Irving Hamer and John Barker of MCS, it is data that drives all MCS educational decisions. Where is the data that says inexperienced Teach for America personnel are worth the millions of dollars spent to lock proven veterans out of the classroom?

Dennis Paden

In my opinion as a retired teacher, and in the opinion of those teachers I speak to who are still in the classroom....it is past time for the person in charge of all this mess to be fired.

From day one Arne Duncan started by attacking teachers' unions. He only went to charter schools, he hung around with the reformers and praised documentaries like Waiting for Superman in which teachers were treated insultingly.

I am sick inside over the way teachers are being treated. Memphis is one of the worst. My thoughts go out to them.

{Of course it's totally unscientific, but here's the letter grade that readers gave the record of placing MCS "surplus teachers".}

Commenter wrote:

Similar stories in many districts. This is just sick.

I'm working with a handful of TFA replacements this year. It's disgusting that anyone with a brain thinks they can waltz in and do a comparable job - or even do better - than the experienced teachers they are replacing.

It's like an alternate universe where up is down, in is out and everyone smiles and pretends the kids are okay.

Another commenter wrote:

I'm mentoring my third TFAer. This sucks.

The first two quit; one in the middle of a semester, the other before finals near the end of the year. Most of these people do not belong in front of classrooms. I have only met one TFAer I would consider qualified to teach, and honestly that is because she went back to school and actually took some classes on her own about education, educational theory & practice. Many TFAers believe the hype about themselves as "saviors" and do not feel like they need the sufficient educational background in order to practice the teaching discipline. It's sad for our students who deserve top tier, qualified instructional professionals.

Piece by piece our public education system is being dismantled by a Democratic administration. That should make us all very angry.

Another commenter wrote:

football coach wasn't it

a master's certified teacher to teach history or a football coach to teach history, in the usa it is an easy choice, football is more important than history in the usa... in france the schools do not waste any resources on sports, all sports teams are run by the towns/regions and have fuck all to do with the schools, in school you have physical education class and that is it for sports.

Another commenter:
Article from Aug. .They fired the teacher of the year.

They applied for money from Bill Gates, and it had strings attached.

http://soetalk.com/2011/08/17/in-memphis-clashes-between-new-and-experienced-teachers/
{Ed.: SOE Talk is an outlet for students, prospective students and alumni of the Johns Hopkins School of Education.}

By Jane Roberts, The Commercial Appeal, Memphis, Tenn. (MCT)

When Memphis City Schools accepted millions of dollars from The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to improve teacher effectiveness, it agreed to tap new pipelines for attracting teachers.

But after at least 190 teachers with no experience were hired over 100 teachers with lots of it, school board members wanted to know Monday if jobs were earmarked for some of the new teachers—and what they are supposed to tell angry constituents.

“Out of North Memphis, I’m getting this phone call: ‘How can you let the teacher of the year last year go when you’re hiring people who don’t have experience?’” board member Sara Lewis said after the meeting. “That needs to be explained to people. People don’t understand. Our issues are (getting) accurate and adequate information.” While Supt. Kriner Cash did not say whether some positions were intentionally left open for Teach for America and other talent partners, he said the process for filling positions was “open and transparent,” and he reminded board members that he has said if any highly qualified teacher is not permanently placed, he will see to it himself that he or she will be.

When the district applied for $90 million from the Gates Foundation in 2009, its proposal said that 30-35 percent of new hires would come from talent pipelines that produce high-quality teacher applicants. In 2009, the district expected it would hire 190 teachers from those sources this year alone. Next year, the number jumps to 235.

With only 5 percent of MCS graduates ready to succeed in college, Cash said the district has to do something different.

“We are trying to change and improve that rate,” he said. “We also have some of the highest numbers of students who are not proficient. … We have to do everything we can to give principals a choice—that is what research shows—give them the latitude to hire staff they need to move the needle.”

The issue boiled over after weekend media reports that the board would be voting on a $1.4 million contract Monday to hire more teachers from an outside group, Memphis Teacher Residency.

This year, MCS signed a contract to place 100 TFA corpsmen, paying their salary plus $4,000 per person to cover training and recruiting costs.

Since 2009, MTR has placed 45 teachers in public and private schools in the area. The residents complete a one-year master’s degree in urban education through Union University and work four days a week in the city schools in supervised mentorship. They also receive a living stipend.

“MTR does not have a contract that requires MCS to hire our residents,” said director David Montague. “What I would like to think is that our teachers are attractive enough that principals hire them because they want them in the building. I would love for them all to get hired in Memphis City Schools, but they are not going to get hired because they have to be hired.”

Memphis Education Association president Keith Williams told board members that displaced teachers had been upstaged by “outsourced labor,” reminding them that new teachers have no record of their success in the classroom. Williams went further, saying they also have no relationships in the city.

Cash said MEA has been part of the discussions, saying, “We are working together on this issue.”

But he was clear that he has little power over anecdotal evidence, and board member Rev. Kenneth Whalum agreed, saying he could do nothing for teachers who say they are being mistreated but insist on anonymity.

Well, guess what? TFA is one of those "pipelines" of talent.

My anger grows.

{AND PEOPLE WONDER WHY EMPLOYEES WANT UNIONS????????????}

Orange Co., CA H.S. Issues ID Cards Based on Test Scores

"John F. Kennedy High School Issues Illegal Student IDs Based On Standardized Test Scores (POLL)" --Huffington Post, October 6, 2011
The article begins:

An Orange County, CA high school has come under fire from state education officials after they issued student ID cards that are color-coded based on their standardized tests scores, the Orange County Register reported.

At John F. Kennedy high school, the cards come in three colors: Black, the highest level, gold, the second best, and white ... the worst.

The cards do more than just announce students' testing levels, however. The gold and black cards also give students access to a variety of discounts and campus privileges, while the white cards give none.

Los Angeles' KABC reported that some parents claim the status cards humiliate their children, after state officials have deemed them a violation of the students' privacy rights, the Anaheim Union High School District is reviewing the program.

Read the full article: "John F. Kennedy High School Issues Illegal Student IDs Based On Standardized Test Scores (POLL)" --Huffington Post, October 6, 2011

Bloomberg Upset at Ruling Against Decades of FDNY Racial Hiring Bias

A federal judge in Brooklyn, New York, today, Wednesday, October 5, 2011, ruled that improved recruitment will not be sufficient to overcome decades of racial bias for white men and against black and Latino job candidates. U.S. District Judge Nicholas Garaufis ruled that there will be court monitoring to ensure that hiring is more diverse.

From Reuters, , "Court to keep tabs on New York City fire department hiring":

U.S. District Judge Nicholas Garaufis, who last week identified "areas of concern and room for improvement" in how the city recruits minority candidates for its fire department, followed up Wednesday with a broad but open-ended draft remedial order that calls on New York City to make a top-to-bottom reassessment of how it handles racial issues in how it recruits, hires and employs black and Hispanic firefighters.

The judge faulted New York City Mayor, Michael Bloomberg's leadership on the issue of Fire Department of New York diversity, ( from the New York Daily News:

While issuing the order, Brooklyn Federal Judge Nicholas Garaufis slammed Mayor Bloomberg and his team for ignoring a mountain of evidence showing discriminatory hiring practices for years.

"Though the city's use of discriminatory hiring practices has persisted through numerous changes in city leadership, the evidence adduced in this case gives the court little hope that Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg or any of his senior leadership has any intention of stepping up to the task of ending discrimination in the FDNY," Garaufis wrote.

Mayor Bloomberg, always the grumpy contrarian curmudgeon, expressed his displeasure with the federal court ruling, from the Daily News, "Mayor Bloomberg slammed by judge for ignoring years of discrimination in FDNY hiring practices"

"The judge was not elected to run the city, and you can rest assured that we'll be in court for a long time," Bloomberg shot back.

The city's and Mayor Bloomberg's contemptuousness about the issue of racial diversity parallels the pattern of the disappearing black and Latino teacher (in the NYC Department of Education) that Sean Ahern has written about.

State education officials knew about scrubbing for years but did nothing: e-mail - NYPOST.com

State education officials knew about scrubbing for years but did nothing: e-mail - NYPOST.com
Duh!!!!

Curious that cheating is substantiated at a New York City school, yet the city feels compelled to study the matter more, yet, all claims against teacher mis-conduct are always substantiated.

Same problem appears in the powers-that-be being unmoved, unfazed over teacher allegations of New York State Regents and other state tests.

In this example from this summer, investigators dismiss the allegations that teachers make. See this story from this summer:

Sharon Otterman, "New York Times", "Under Bloomberg, a Sharp Rise in Accusations of Cheating by Educators", August 22, 2011.

REVERSAL: STUDY OF ERASURE ANALYSIS AND NY TEST CHEATING ALLEGATIONS

Sharon Otterman, "New York Times," "State Says It Analyzed Test Erasures for Cheating; 62 Schools Proved Suspect" September 23, 2011.

In New York State, however, education officials have said the spark that set off most of the investigations in those places, a procedure called erasure analysis of standardized tests, was something they could not afford and did not do.

Yet officials revealed this week that the State Education Department had quietly been conducting erasure analysis on some high school Regents exams for more than three years, a process that red-flagged 64 incidents of possible problems, including one that led to the ouster of an assistant principal in the Bronx.

And after an audit by the state comptroller raised concerns about cheating in 2010, the State Board of Regents voted, to little notice, to expand such analysis to six additional tests last school year, and to all Regents exams in 2011-12, though the necessary funds were never authorized.

Bank Street Conference on Helping Schools, Not Closing Them

This last weekend, Saturday, September 24, 2011:
Rachel Cromidas, "Event aims to teach city to help schools instead of closing them" Sept. 23, 2011 at GothamSchools.

The city official in charge of closing schools and the union chief who has sued to keep schools open are both set to speak at a conference tomorrow about what can be done to help schools without shuttering them.

The conference, “Effective Alternatives to School Closings: Transforming Struggling Schools in NYC,” was organized by the Coalition for Educational Justice, the Alliance for Quality Education, and the Urban Youth Collaborative, all advocacy organizations. The event is meant to send a message to city policymakers that there are ways to reform failing schools without shutting them down, according to Ronnette Summers, a parent and CEJ member who helped organize it.

The city Department of Education has closed 117 schools since 2002 and Schools Chancellor Dennis Walcott said this week that he plans to close additional schools, particularly middle schools, that do not meet the department’s standards.

“Every year there’s more and more schools on the closing list and that seems to be the only reform strategy that the Department of Education uses to improve schools,” Summers said. “People in places where they know [closure] is not working felt that it was important to bring it to New York City to let them see that there’s other ways to improve schools.”

Click to this link, to get full article, and six page Scribd document.

UPDATE: Comptroller Nixes No-Bid NYS Contract w/ Murdoch Firm; Will Steiner Get Penalty?

New York State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli cancelled the no-bid $27 million contract that the New York State Department of Education made with Rupert Murdoch's Wireless Communications. The contract came just weeks after New York City Schools Chancellor Joel Klein left the New York City Department of Education to work on Murdoch's News Corporation. The contract was to have enabled schools to track student and teacher data. The Daily News' article on the story. Former New York State Education Commissioner David Steiner, who inspired some of us a year or two back with his recognition that European teachers pride themselves in their knowledge of their subject, has had his slip-ups. Last year he signed off on the wacky idea of Cathy Black as New York City Schools Chancellor.

Latest on Steiner: He is caught in a conflict of interest scandal in benefiting from a corporate-paid junket to London, England, United Kingdom. Soon after Steiner's London trip, Pearson found itself in a $32 million dollar deal with New York State. From the New York Daily News:

A State Education Department commissioner took a roughly $2,000 junket financed by the charity of a learning firm that later won a $32 million state contract. Then-Commissioner David Steiner traveled to London in June 2010 for a conference held by the Council of Chief State School Officers - which reimbursed him for his expenses. Ultimately, the foundation connected to education firm Pearson gave money to the council to foot the conference's bill. Six months later, the state contracted with Pearson to develop new math and reading tests. "It doesn't take long for people to connect the dots," said Jack Jennings of the Washington think tank Center on Education Policy.

Read Rachel Monahan's story in the New York Daily News.

UFT Gives In: Schedules Mass ATR Meetings; Scheduling SNAFUs

The United Federation of Teachers (UFT) has conceded to demands for Absent Teacher Reserve (ATR) teachers to have more voice.
However, some developments suggest that the UFT is dampening potential groundswell factors.
First, the meeting was to be a single one (see this flyer at Ed Notes), at the Brooklyn Marriott building offices of the Brooklyn UFT. But a single site could see too much agitation for Unity to manage. (Classroom management anyone?)
The UFT split the meetings into successive nights: October 3 in the Bronx, October 4 in Brooklyn, October 5 in Staten Island, October 6 in Queens and October 11 in Manhattan.
(See the poster at the UFT website.)
Should the UFT reconsider siting important meetings at its Bronx offices? That site is close to major highways, but otherwise it is difficult to access: it is only near the 6 train and the buses that go to Westchester Square, Bx 4, 4A, 8, 21, 31, 40, 42.
And most important of all, when were the meeting schedulers last teachers themselves? Have they forgotten that the first Mondays of the month are routinely the days of faculty conferences? ATRs leaving after the school bell on Monday, October 3 could get written up for missing the faculty conference. Besides, won't teachers already tired from the faculty conference be a little too burned out to attend another meeting?

Great John Liu DOE Audits: School Space Estimates --w/ UPDATE; Use of ATRs

New York City Comptroller John Liu has made some important audits in the past few weeks, as regard to the New York City Department of Education's measurement of the use of school space (lest we use the word, "assessment") and the city's use of teachers in the Absent Teacher Reserve (ATR).

First was the audit of the use of ATRs.
See Phylissa Cramer's "Comptroller’s audit criticizes city’s handling of ATR pool" at Gotham Schools.
Quick summary, from lede of the story:

The Department of Education could potentially be doing more to help teachers whose positions have been eliminated find new jobs.

That’s one conclusion of an audit conducted by Comptroller John Liu of the DOE’s efforts to help members of the Absent Teacher Reserve, the pool of teachers whose jobs were lost to budget cuts, enrollment changes, or school closures. The audit concluded that the vast majority of ATRs — 95 percent — are working full-time in teaching jobs, but that the department doesn’t maintain data sufficient to conclude whether its efforts to help the teachers find permanent positions are paying off.

Then, there was his audit of the New York City Department of Education "Blue Book" estimates of the use of school space. As the Daily News explains, "The book is used to help determine what neighborhoods need more school buildings as well as space-sharing arrangements."
Gotham News reported:

To evaluate the city’s success at ensuring accurate Blue Book data [calculations of school space use], Liu’s office analyzed entries for 23 schools and found that space assessments for 10 percent of all rooms were incorrect in a way that affected the school’s overall capacity.

The quick summary (from Gotham Schools) of his findings:

The newest audit examines the city’s “Blue Book,” which contains space estimates for each school building. The DOE and the School Construction Authority use the Blue Book to guide how many students can be placed in a school, and how many schools can fit into a building. Critics, including members of the City Council, say Blue Book numbers don’t always reflect reality — for example, suggesting that an additional class could fit into an art room — and that decisions based on them can leave schools crunched for space.

This story has some relevance to teachers, since it relates to how much space the city allots to schools and the measure of capacity utilization. Under utilization is one of several measures by which the city justifies closing or scaling back some schools' operation or student enrollment.
See the full Phyllisa Cramer story at Gotham News.

See the full Rachel Monahan story at the New York Daily News.

UPDATE:
Mr. Data Mayor (Bloomberg) really is the fraud when it comes to numbers and managing resources in the New York City schools. He just can't anything right.
New from the United Federation of Teachers (UFT) website is: UFT survey finds nearly 7,000 oversize classes as NYC school year opens: An estimated 250,000 students spending all or part of each day in overcrowded classrooms"

The number of classroom teachers has fallen as class sizes have risen. Based on the system’s records, this fall there were 73,784 classroom teachers, compared with 76,127 in 2010; 77,784 in 2009 and 80,649 in 2008.
. . . .
Because arbitrators’ rulings are enforceable in court, the system generally lowers class sizes as hearing dates approach. However, because the hearings are scheduled over a number of weeks, some large classes remain so for weeks; the contract also permits certain exceptions, meaning that some classes remain oversize the entire semester.

Does Thompson Think that the UFT is the Wimpiest Municipal Union of Them All?

A very interesting nugget appeared on the inner page continuation of an article in the September 2, 2011 edition of the Chief-Leader."

Former New York City Comptroller and 2009 sacrificial lamb Democratic Party nominee against Mayor Michael Bloomberg, William Thompson appeared at a public panel on the state of New York City public education, along with a variety of figures in New York City education. Representing the United Federation of Teachers (UFT) was Vice-President Leo Casey.

On the topic of a new contract between the UFT and the New York City Department of Education, Thompson was more pessimistic about the prospects of a contract under Bloomberg than was Casey.
Casey:

Let's sit down, let's work out issues before us . . . there's no reason why we can't [talk in the course of negotiating a contract].

Thompson:

There is not going to be a contract under the Bloomberg administration.

He added:

The attitudes of other municipal unions are, we'll wait for the next [Mayor].

From this exchange, one can easily suspect that the other municipal unions are reading the city's behavior viz. a viz. municipal unions. And they are being savvy and refraining from negotiations that would include colossal givebacks, let alone making conciliatory comments toward the mayor. (And wasn't it a mistake for the UFT to avoid endorsing Thompson inn 2009?)