Search Results for: SB 191

A couple weeks ago I brought your attention to the fact that it was THE week for Senate Bill 191, the monumental effort to reform Colorado’s teacher evaluation and tenure system. Well, now that THE week is over and the bill passed the senate, this week really is THE week — as it goes up for a critical House Education Committee vote on Thursday. In the meantime, the heated debate over SB 191 has brought attention back to a locally-negotiated special perk for many teachers unions — tax-funded release time from the classroom for teachers to lobby against the bill. I have asked the question before: Where is the accountability for school employee union leave activities? In an op-ed published three (count ’em, three) places since Friday, my Education Policy Center friend Ben DeGrow says the latest experience with release time to rally against SB 191 makes the issue as relevant and as significant as ever. Take your pick:

As far as education reform issues go, this year’s Colorado legislative session has been kind of humdrum. Until now. Yes, this week is THE week. Senate Bill 191 — the proposal I’ve told you about that will overhaul our state’s evaluation and tenure system for the better — will be heard in the Senate Education Committee on Wednesday and Thursday. If you’re not too familiar with SB 191, or you want a better sense of what exactly it will do and which groups are lining up to support or oppose the bill, then click the play button below (or follow this link) to listen to lead sponsor Senator Michael Johnston, D-Denver, discuss it with Ben DeGrow on a new iVoices podcast: Stay tuned. My Education Policy Center friends and I have just begun to cover this issue. (And if there happens to be another “THE week” after this one, don’t blame me for my youthful exuberance and excitement.

The Colorado state legislature has been in session for three months now (only one more to go!), and finally we get to the excitement of debating a truly significant education reform bill. With Democratic state senator Michael Johnston at the forefront, the newly introduced Senate Bill 191 (PDF) would overhaul our state’s teacher evaluation and tenure system for the better. Here’s a strong flavor of what the legislation proposes to do: Key provisions of the bill include annual teacher and principal evaluations, with teacher evaluations to be based 50 percent on student growth and principal evaluations based two-thirds on student growth and the demonstrated effectiveness of a principal’s teachers. The bill also would require that tenure be earned after three consecutive years of effectiveness as determined by evaluations. Tenured teachers could be returned to probation if they don’t have good evaluations for two years. The bill also would require the mutual consent for placement of teachers in specific schools and establishes procedures for handling teachers who aren’t placed. It also specifies that evaluations can be considered when layoffs are made.

It’s Friday again, friends. Fortunately, I have good news to share after Monday’s depressing post about Justice Scalia’s passing and what it means for education. One of the “abominable snowbills” I wrote about a few weeks ago has died—and died rather spectacularly—in the Senate Education Committee. From a previous post: Senate Bill 105, which is being supported by a “bipartisan” group of senators that makes me feel like I’ve fallen into Bizzaro World, forgoes any pretense and just murders SB 191 entirely. It removes the 50 percent requirement for student growth in educator evaluations, forbids school districts from using student growth in evaluations in any amount exceeding 20 percent (an apparently arbitrary number that flies in the face of the research on the subject), and makes so local school boards can allow teachers and principals with effective or better ratings to pass on evaluations for up to three years… Most of you probably remember that I didn’t much care for those changes, arguing that they would return us to the days when nearly every teacher was rated effective year after year and essentially destroy tenure reform, pay-for-performance systems, and even the basic practice of evaluating teachers annually. My policy friend […]

It’s almost Turkey Day, and that means it’s time to start thinking about the things we’re thankful for. At the top of my list are my dog, my parents, and pumpkin pie with Cool Whip on it. But while I sit here smacking my lips at the thought of tomorrow’s pie, some school districts are feeling thankful for a very different reason: This year’s reprieve from SB-191’s requirement that 50 percent of teacher evaluations be based on multiple measures of student learning. This afternoon, Chalkbeat posted an article detailing some of the districts that have chosen to press ahead with SB-191’s requirements along with some others that have chosen to wait. The article is based on a survey of Colorado’s 20 largest districts, which together employ more than two-thirds of the state teachers. Chalkbeat found that just over half of the districts—including our friends in Douglas and Jefferson County—have decided to forge ahead as originally planned. Some other districts have decided to weight their growth data at zero percent of the evaluation formula, basing evaluations only on professional quality standards. The lone outlier from the 50-0 dichotomy is Mesa, which decided to weight growth data at 25 percent for the […]

Since yesterday’s school choice trifecta was so successful, why not another one to help bring a smashing conclusion to National School Choice Week? We’re in the heart of basketball season — it’s not March Madness time yet — but still “trifecta” gets me thinking about making that long-range jumper for student-centered education reform:

Nobody in the education world is talking about anything else, so why not just make it official and call this “Race to the Top week”? The fallout continues. In an exclusive interview on Tuesday, State Board of Education member Marcia Neal told my Education Policy Center friends that we might see an effort to slow down or roll back Senate Bill 191: Colorado’s landmark teacher tenure and evaluation reform. I’m not sure if she was thinking it would happen this week, but open up the opinion section of today’s Denver Post, and you’ll see a guest column written by Cherry Creek educator Brian Kurz titled “Go back and fix SB 191.” My modest suggestion would be for the author to go back and check some of his facts and assumptions. First: [Bill sponsor] Michael Johnston authored SB 191 and pushed its passage as a way to better position Colorado for Race to the Top money. Johnston knew first-hand the obvious flaws with both the language of [sic] bill and the ambiguity of how to achieve its goals. Despite the lack of specifics, the bill was Colorado’s chance at a $175 million lottery. While Johnston certainly expressed hopes of winning Race […]

Deep down we know that our public school teachers are anything but a “one-size-fits-all” model. They’re human beings, right? And not only are some more effective at their jobs, but they also often have different experiences, philosophies and points of view. As Mike Antonucci observed in pointing out an online Alexander Russo interview with Pennsylvania Teacher of the Year Michelle Switala, the most recognized successful teachers especially tend to have a maverick quality about them. Locally we have an even better and timelier example, as CEA member teacher and fellow Ed News Colorado blogger Mark Sass takes union leaders to task for their disingenuous attacks on SB 191: Colorado’s teacher effectiveness bill. Among other things, Sass points out that he and a few other CEA member teachers testified in favor of the legislation. Unlike in many other states, Colorado teachers can choose to join or not join a union or other professional organization. And many make their decisions to do so for a wide variety of reasons. The information on our Independent Teachers website is there to help them. But it’s disappointing (and hardly surprising) to see CEA leaders sometimes act as if they’re speaking on behalf of all their […]

I’m back after a brief hiatus, and we’ve got some catching up to do on the legislative front. Specifically, we can celebrate the fact that Sen. Michael Merrifield has learned once again that doing the same thing over and over again may not be the best approach. I wrote a rather snarky post a few weeks ago about Merrifield’s SB 067, which was functionally identical to last year’s SB 105. Both bills sought to gut tenure reform, performance pay, and merit-based personnel decisions by essentially blowing up strong educator evaluations. In particular, Merrifield was once again attempting to eliminate the requirement that evaluations include multiple measures of student growth. And once again, he failed to do so.

Everybody’s heard this famous advice: If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again. I have certainly heard my dad say something like that many times before. State Senator Mike Merrifield (remember him?) and his legislative allies must have also heard the saying somewhere, because they recently introduced Senate Bill 17-067—a practically identical copy of last year’s spectacularly defeated Senate Bill 16-105. The complete unwillingness to listen to any of the feedback—or learn any of the political lessons—that came out of the SB 105 debacle last year is striking. That old saying about trying again is definitely a good reminder of the importance of persistence, but I’m not sure it should be interpreted as refusing ever to rethink one’s position on bad public policy. After all, the saying is not “If at first you don’t succeed, disregard all feedback and do exactly the same thing again.” I could write a big blog post about why SB 067 is bad policy that holds the potential to harm students; destroy important collective bargaining reform, teacher tenure reform, performance-based compensation systems, and a variety of other things (which is its intended purpose); and decrease fairness for teachers by refusing to acknowledge and reward […]