School board won’t force schools to offer advanced math

21 Comments

1. No wonder that a once great school district is circling the drain.
   The inmates are running the asylum.

2. So much for the board being the local “check” mechanism. 
   Please report about PAH’s students who stood up to talk about a Drama teacher let go? One after the another, students stood and talked about the Drama teacher who supported them after the recent suicide. They spoke about late Summer who was part of the Drama class. They talked about the class being their refuge.
   This is not uncommon in high schools – Drama class being the refuge. 
   One student even explained to the board a possible reason for declining enrollment to the drama class: NEW TEACHER EVERY YEAR. That is turnover. 
    So the same “local governance” who decided the drama teacher should go, ignoring the well being of students who found refuge in the class, who spoke about the support they got there after the suicide, same “local governance” decided to ignore the many dozens of students who spoke up to the board during the years.
   And the board would not enforce their own decision.  

3. “rejected by principals and teachers” yes, but not all teachers. One teacher from PALY spoke at Board Meeting and said he was” ready and the enrollment was there”. One great point that was brought up was the fact that accelerated math in the middle school will create opportunities for more advanced math courses. Not much different from being able to take two years of a foreign language at the middle school and not having to take the beginning course at the high school. This is Palo Alto. Offering AP courses, in every academic area should be a priority. Sure, normal kids will take what is needed but Palo Alto is not normal. This community has always valued education in both academics and electives. If the desire from the students is there, and we have qualified staff, lets get the ball rolling again.

4. As a retired reporter who has attended hundreds of school board meetings around the Bay Area, I feel sorry for Branden Cartwright and other reporters who have to attend these meetings and write about them. PAUSD board members obviously don’t know whether they’re coming or going.

5. Depriving future engineers the classes they need to get into a excellent college program. Letting teachers run the schools. This will get candidates to run this fall.

6. If the union is in charge, why do we need a school board?

   Dharap has been the Harrison Bergeron guy from Day One. The big disappointment has been Segal, who promised to stand up for all students, but hasn’t.

   I think Castilleja offers Multivariable Calculus. That could theoretically help half of PAUSD.

7. “School board won’t force schools to offer advanced math”…..

   So, if there is a willing teacher and enough students, I guess the question (or headline) could be, “Will the school board prevent schools from offering advanced math?”

   Sorry to hear about the Drama class situation. The Arts are usually the first thing to see the ax unfortunately.

   Imagine if between the students served by Drama and Multivariable Calculus that most of them benefit a lot and feel more connected to the school and community because of the courses. Is that worthy investment? I would assume so.

   I hope things work out best for students.

8. Since most potential multivariable calculus students probably have driver licenses, why not take the course at Foothill College?

   • It’s a problem with the grade not showing up on their high school transcripts. At least that is what I have seen people upset about on other comment sections. But they get a transcript from the college that says they passed the class, which is also impressive. Some parents will cite transportation as an issue, others will say that it’s a problem with after school extracurriculars and sports timing, but if that is already a massive pressure on your child, it may not be the best idea to have them taking college level math anyways…

9. Or how about they move to a neighboring school district, most of which offer MVC, like Mountain View Los Altos?

   The real story here is that Don Austin got angry at the MVC parents and retaliated against them. That’s how he operates. He knew that letting the faculty council decide would result in a “no.” Yet he could claim somebody else made the decision. Glad the board finally fired him.

   • Everyone wants Don Austin to relinquish control to teachers. “Listen to teachers. Respect teachers.” and then he does and the teachers decide against it and all of a sudden we are pro top down management. The amount of comments I see accusing Austin of being a top down dictator is crazy considering that in real time we are getting mad that he didn’t endorse forcing the staff to do something they didn’t want to do. If you think he knew that the faculty council would decide “no” WHAT MAKES YOU THINK THE FACULTY WANT TO DO IT?? The real story here is that the community can’t decide whether they respect what teachers have to say or they want the board (many of whom are not and have never been educators) to force the teachers to do what they want! Maybe if we picked one we could finally move forward in either direction.

     • Amen to this. It makes no sense. Sometimes Dr. Austin is all-controlling and sometimes we’re mad that he gives sites and educators autonomy. It all depends on what side of the issue they fall. But it is definitely not intellectually consistent.

10. Don be gone thank goodness. Unfortunately, as has been the case under his “leadership”, students and parents are left holding the bag and I doubt he cares one fig.

11. The “authoritarian left” knows what’s best for you.

12. No authoritarian knows what’s best for anybody other than themselves, Austin included.

13. We are dumbing down our society to enable the dim bulbs to feel good about themselves.

    • Calling THE MAJORITY OF kids “dim bulbs” because they won’t take MVC in the midst of another suicide cluster is actually insane!!! What was the number? Like 26 kids are going to be taking this class (that number may have gone up since the last I checked but it is not some huge majority of kids either way). EVERYONE ELSE is stupid to you now. This is why the council voted no and cited “balance and wellness”. Because the kids who won’t or can’t take it at school will be made to feel less than those who can. And you are proving that point right now. Your light must be turned all the way off for you to comment something so dense and out of touch here. Read the room.

14. Regarding Austin and teacher control, I can say from experience that his subordinates in my time did their level best to control what teachers taught, how they taught, how they graded, and how they were trained.

    In my last five years a big effort was made to convince teachers that they were racist, homophobic, and unfair graders. Of course, administrators could be none of these, so they held the upper hand and teachers who pushed back were targeted for harassment.

    I was officially reprimanded because I taught seventh graders aspects of the U.S. Constitution in lieu of lessons about how Roman governance influenced American governance. Departments across the middle schools had stated in writing that this was an area that needed more exploration, but that didn’t matter. My reprimand stated that I “refused to teach the required curriculum” and that “I was doing a disservice to all of my students”. None of which was true, but I was ordered to cease those lessons immediately or face further discipline.

    Ironically, the principal, who was my accuser and evaluator, never observed me teach seventh grade, never sat down with me to discuss my objectives, and never completed my legally required evaluation.

    So, trust me, Austin was only giving teachers the leeway with multi-variable calculus to deflect the controversy away from himself. He did not see a “Simple Win” on this one, so he passed the buck, period.

    • Are you talking about Standards Based Grading? Which is a statewide push? This is not unique to PAUSD. Or some places are calling it Evidence Based Grading, but the way you’re being told to grade as an educator is supposed to help you separate behaviors and biases from academic proficiency. I know because I was ALSO trained on Standards Based Grading. I was told the same spiel about how teachers have biases and can negatively impact a student’s learning environment if they aren’t grading based on academic proficiency only. I have seen a ton of pushback on that. Kids don’t deserve to be subjected to their teacher’s biases. They should be graded on actual mastery of a subject. No one said “you’re racist and unfair” they said that the system in which we are trying to educate lends itself to unfairness when teachers hold biases (consciously or unconsciously). Your interpretation is interesting though.
      Required curriculum in California is not typically decided at a school district level unless it’s a private school or an art program haha (most admin don’t know what happens in an art room and frankly don’t care) State Board of Education, California Department of Education, and the California State Standards are all right there. You either met standards in your lessons or you didn’t.
      But again and regardless- you see that the teachers were in control of this MVC situation and that they didn’t want to move forward with it at a site level and somehow that is still Austin’s fault for not letting the teachers be steamrolled and dictated by some parents and very vocal board members. You can say he did this to shift blame all you want, but not listening to the teachers is a problem. I thought that you, being a former teacher, would understand that more than anyone else. We trust people to run our schools who have never set foot in a classroom and then the people who are there EVERY DAY, the community is calling stupid for not doing exactly what the parents want.

15. Proponents of standards based or evidence-based grading make the assumption that teachers are biased and that their grades are arbitrary, which in itself is a bias. The idea that teachers don’t use standards or evidence to arrive at a grade is an insult to their professionalism.

    I took all sorts of assessment courses during my credentialing and subsequent professional development. SBG, as it was sold to us by a Pearson “teacher rep”, was convoluted and unduly time consuming. When I noted that the Pearson paid teacher’s grade distributions, which he displayed, were no different than most teachers, I was cut out of the discussion by an administrator. In addition, the version we were “sold” stated that the only thing graded would be assessments (tests), and that nothing else could count. If students did or did not do any classwork, homework, or participate in class activities, that could not be reflected in a grade.

    Students would be given four attempts at assessments, with re-takes happening at lunch. Students not “keeping up” on assessments were to be re-taught the material at lunch as well, or during class while the rest of the students did something else. By the time a student got their lunch there was less than a half hour to do anything. Of course, teachers don’t really need lunch breaks.

    It didn’t take long for some gifted students to figure out how to game the system, and for students who struggle on tests to fall further behind. Teachers began to get frustrated with students who didn’t show up at lunch, and more students were getting sub-par grades because everything rode on the assessment or the re-takes no matter how hard a student worked or achieved in other areas. Grades took longer to calculate and were assigned numbers instead of letters.

    Apparently, the numbers were going to take the emphasis away from the grade and place it on the standards mastered (or not). I guess calling an “A” a 3 or 3.1 would somehow fool kids. Since PAUSD uses one platform to calculate grades and one to report them, the numbers had to be converted back to letters on the final report card. More convolution and in some cases flat out grade inflation.

    None of this mattered because the artificial grade augmentation meant way fewer D’s and F’s on paper whether or not students had learned the material. 25 Churchill loved that feature, plus they could also say that “all teachers grade the same way”. Very convenient when teachers are not being properly evaluated because administrators don’t have to have one on one discussions about grading with teachers, so one less thing to evaluate, if the evaluation is done at all.

    Yes, there are teachers that take short-cuts who don’t have exemplary grading systems, but to assume that all teachers operate that way, and to foist an ungainly system on them that confused both students and parents was and is an unreasonable ask. Administrators used to coach teachers whose grading systems seemed off, but that doesn’t happen much anymore.

    During 27 years of PAUSD service I never once had a parent or student complain about my grading system. Why? Because it was inherently balanced and fair with wiggle room built in if necessary. Instead of probing successful systems through interaction with teachers, PAUSD leadership just assumed we were all biased and had to be told how to grade. In other words, grading, like so many other things in PAUSD, had to be politicized in a way that eroded trust in teachers and placed more power in the hands of administrators who spend less and less time observing teachers. As far as listening to teachers, that is a very selective process, and those who say what 25 Churchill wants to hear get the most “air time” by far.

    I am not challenging the efficacy of SBG, because if it is done properly, it has its benefits. But as we have seen over and over now, the leadership at 25 Churchill is not the best at delivering on “The Promise”.

    Thank you for your thoughtful observations DES.

16. Regarding “State Standards”: Those are written with the assumption that there are no classroom interruptions and that every instructional minute is devoted to the standards. There are content standards, common core standards, and PAUSD has added technology standards as well. Every year I taught, the number of standards grew. In other words, old standards were not replaced, they were just augmented by more standards.

    When I was hired in 1994, the head of curriculum and instruction told me, “The state standards are guidelines, but you are going to need to get creative in order to engage these students”. In other words, ticking off ever growing standards is not the same as educating.

    I understand that there has to be guidance and accountability, but I don’t think I can name a single teacher I knew that covered, let alone taught and assessed all of the state and local standards in one school year. In other words, teachers had to prioritize the standards, usually with little or no guidance from administration.

    Keep in mind that coaching and imposing are two different animals. Under Austin, imposing became the norm (with MVC being an exception) and coaching fell by the wayside. Imposing requires a lot less effort than coaching, as we all know.

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