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Commentary

Cutting through the fear

Tuesday, July 6, 2010

A teacher who says he had a great principal and spectacular success with an honors class this year is leaving for another state for family reasons. His parting comments:

Most teachers are not as fortunate. They hate working for CMS. But he didn’t say why teachers hate working for CMS, just that he thinks very few teachers will explain why because they are afraid of losing their jobs.

So if any of what he says is true, how are we the public supposed to agitate for fixes if we can’t even be sure what’s broken?

The stakes are high: If higher student achievement is tied to more effective teaching, and I have no doubt it is, we shouldn’t expect effective teaching if barriers to effective teaching are left in place.

So what how do we proceed?