Sexual Abuse in the New York School System

           The issue of sexual abuse in the New York school system is a very sensitive issue to pretty much everyone in New York and also a huge headline for the news every time it happens. It is rightfully a sensitive issue since it leaves many questions such as how it happened? What could have possessed a teacher to do it? Why would anyone hire a teacher like this? Could it be happening in my own school?!
          However, this panic then leads to more problems. For instance, with all these questions, the issue of this teachers actions are easily attributed to their bosses, the principals and superintendents of the school, when they probably didn't even know it was happening. This then leads to these principals and superintendents getting transferred when no one told them that these teachers were committing this horrible act. Yet this is lost in the panic, and people all of a sudden expect school officials to know all that is happening in their schools at every second. The argument then becomes "Well isn't that what they are paid to do? Keep track of everything in their schools?" and this is true. However, just because they are getting paid doesn't mean that they can suddenly become all knowing. Human limitations still apply to them. In addition to this, the teachers committing these acts don't just do them where everyone can see. Also, these teachers can threaten kids into not telling anyone about it. Now if a school official does know about the abuse and allows it to continue, then that clearly should be punished.
          Also, people have to remember that we live in a society which is supposed to believe that those who are allegedly charged with a crime are still innocent until proven guilty. This could clearly be seen in the recent case in Syracuse University where a few men alleged that Bernie Fine had abused them when they attended Syracuse University. Fairly recently, one of the accusers has confessed that he only accused him for revenge against Fine for reasons other than sexual abuse. This was after weeks of scrutiny, under which Fine lost his job and was basically ostracized by society. Now there are other accusers so Fine isn't off the hook yet; however this shows how, in some cases (NOT ALL), kids can just blindly accuse teachers of doing these acts without evidence, and yet society will totally, without a doubt believe him or her. Now I'm not saying that we shouldn't  take kids who say they have been abused seriously, but rather that we need to investigate the case before blindly casting judgement on the accused.
          I hope I haven't offended in this post because that isn't what I intended to do. I just feel that these are serious flaws in how we look at these cases and we need to fix them. I'm the first to admit, I don't have the answers, but I still feel that we need to bring this up and look for a solution. Also, sorry there is no cartoon, but I can't find any that really fits well into this.

The Finns Consistently Win like New York's Rising Star: Jeremy Lin

There's no straightforward way of going about diagnosing our country's current quandary with the Department of Education. With the failure of George Bush’s No Child Left Behind Policy, enacted in 2001, we can only hope that more meticulous, successful education reforms will surface in time to be implemented while we as high school students are still able to enjoy and beneficially reap any remuneration of said aforementioned changes- that is, if any are to come. Finland, a Scandinavian country, is categorically well-known and repeatedly referenced to wintry sports such as skiing and snowboarding, mostly due in part to Finland’s culture resulting from geography and native climate- mountainous and frosty. However, there’s another reason for Finland’s rising fame amongst the global community, and it has nothing to do with extreme winter sports. No, Finland has one of the best reading and math scores amongst millions of other contending students in the world, all especially thanks to an educational reform that was put into effect some forty years ago. In one article published from the Smithsonian, it states: “The transformation of the Finns’ education system began some 40 years ago as the key propellent of the country’s economic recovery plan. Educators had little idea it was so successful until 2000, when the first results from the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), a standardized test given to 15-year-olds in more than 40 global venues, revealed Finnish youth to be the best young readers in the world. Three years later, they led in math. By 2006, Finland was first out of 57 countries (and a few cities) in science. In the 2009 PISA scores released last year, the nation came in second in science, third in reading and sixth in math among nearly half a million students worldwide.” Read more: http://www.smithsonianmag.com/people-places/Why-Are-Finlands-Schools-Successful.html#ixzz1np6rttDc. Now, take into consideration our countries current stance on education. John Hood wrote an excellent post on the United States report card from the turn of the twentieth century to the turn of the twenty-first century, and dishes out evidence that there is in fact a diagnosis for our country’s problem when it comes to education and fruitless attempts at reform- just look at the statistics. Read more: http://www.thefreemanonline.org/columns/the-failure-of-american-public-education/. Numbers, unlike the new arrangements of data recently obtained by the media that attempted to configure the best and the worst teachers according to a spurious and unwarranted formula, as trite as it may sound, don’t lie. Just today, twenty-six states, including the District of Columbia, submitted requests to the DOE for abdications from the NCLB, “[adding] to the 11 states that the Obama Administration announced earlier this month had developed and agreed to implement bold education reforms in exchange for relief from burdensome federal mandates.“ Read more: http://www.ed.gov/news/press-releases/26-more-states-and-dc-seek-flexibility-nclb-drive-education-reforms-second-round. We consistently try to fix the problem with reform after reform, with little to no results to show for. If one were to Google a Regents exam dating back to the year 1900, they would be shocked at the level of difficulty that was presented within reading and math. Speaking as a student myself, I found the 1900 Regents exam substantiating and hard. At one section in the test, it was required that a replication of the geography of Europe was known to pass the exam. If this test were administered today, I feel that a good 70%-80% of students taking the test would fail, and that is just a guesstimation on my part. It’s sad to say but it’s the compelling truth: the Regents has been dumbed down significantly year after year since the 1900’s, perhaps, in my opinion, to allow a greater percentage of ridiculously lazy students the opportunity to pass the exam subsequently because the level of difficulty is virtually non-existent, so as to not really exhibit any signs that something is wrong with the way our students are being taught, and their deteriorating interest for even receiving an education to begin with! Now, I’m not admonishing the Regents for being too easy- because there is some, although little, difficulty present within the actual test. But I feel as though the biggest problem we have has nothing to do with class size, or money, or ethnicity, means of income, etc. My take on the whole dilemma is that we as students have truly lost something great thinkers of past generations once had in terms of getting a good education: interest. I might be wrong on this, but if you were to ask any child about what they’re learning in school these days, they probably would have to hesitate or refer back to their notes, simply put, because there is no INTEREST existing within the subjects that child is taking. He/she may have a particular interest in one or two subjects, but in regards to subjects that child might not be so remarkable at, there is no interest within that subject, because in that child’s head, that subject is probably the ineptest subject that could be undertaken, and that’s a scary thought to cogitate. One teacher in West Virginia actually tried implementing the similar teaching techniques found in Finland to his school as an experiment to see if what worked for a homogenous group of people would work for a heterogonous group of culturally diverse students. Read more: http://www.cnn.com/2011/US/08/29/education.wv.finland/index.html. Although it’s not certain that copying their educational system, which has no existing charter schools, would work for a country so politically and socially different from the Finns. However, their value and appreciation for teacher’s, and the level of interest the students have in the classroom, is something to both admire and delve more deeply into. Who knows, perhaps the solution to this complex problem our great country is facing is one that is paradoxically simple in juxtaposition. 

Students Surveying Teachers

          On Tuesday we discussed the flaws in our education policies and new ways that are being implemented in attempt to work out these flaws. One of the most prominent new policies that I would like to elaborate upon was the one mentioned by Mr.Bonamo: Students will be surveyed on the effectiveness of a particular teacher and the surveys will account for 10% of the teacher's overall performance.
          I believe this is highly unfair towards teachers. Being a teacher is a cumbersome task because they are responsible for developing the minds of several young individuals. Teachers don't just educate students on how to solve problems or learn facts, they influence the student's way of thought. I don't believe something with such a significant impact that is achieved in a complicated way can be scored on a scale. Too many things go into it.
          Furthermore, a student can be naturally bright or have external factors like tutors and pressing parents that motivate them and help them perform better in school. Some students may not have those advantages, or they can just easily be apathetic towards a certain class.
          So how is it fair that teachers are going to be graded partially by what students say? I'm not saying student responses hold no value, they do, but there's too much room for error. Students may be biased or bribed. They might not have the ability to think so objectively and set their personal experiences aside. Whether those experiences are positive or negative, they can be very off base about the teacher's effectiveness while teaching.

All these factors deeply affect our teachers and future education system. I believe the officials that made up these policies of scaled reports should reconsider them.

Role of School Staff in Abuse Cases

            Continuing to explore the realm of our education system in New York, I decided to discuss the unfortunate events of sexual abuse that have been occurring in our schools. I began my research looking at the accounts that have already been made to known to us. From there, another article about another 30 year old school aide who abused fourth grade girls has emerged and one more from Darryl Lynch who was arrested for touching a 14 year old girl as well. According to the Wall Street Journal, the 30yr old, Brett Picou, was “the fifth school employee accused of sexually abusing children in recent weeks.”

            In the same incident, one of the victims said, "I'm a little girl, you are not supposed to do that to me," and in reply Picou said “"Oh, it's like that," and did not apologize.” In this particular case, Picou was not found to ever have had any previous physical or sexual cases or crimes against him in his file. So in this case, Chancellor Dennis Walcott’s vow to investigate any and all substantiated cases of misconduct dating to 2000 would not help since this just seems like a freak accident where a new offender emerged. Thankfully a victim reported the incident to the principal and the police were notified.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203960804577241831739507046.html?KEYWORDS=education+sexual+abuse

            However, in another incident with another offender, Wilbert Cortez who abused 2 boys, I was appalled to learn that the notification process with police took even longer due to incompetency of other teachers. I read the entire investigation report written on the case and to my utter dismay, when one of the victims in this story informed another teacher that he was touched inappropriately by Cortez, “the teacher offered to sit down with the boy and Cortez to “straighten things out.” Not surprisingly, [the child] declined the solution and suggested that he stop attending Cortez’s class. However, [the teacher] said that the boy had to go to computer class.” Mind you, this all transpired after the 3^RD incident between the same boy and Cortez.

http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/02/16/queens-teacher-charged-with-sexually-abusing-boys/

The failure of this teacher to inform an official or an authority allowed for other abuses to be committed to other students. This to me was the most frustrating. As in a court case called Franklin v. Gwinnet County (1992) under teacher and student personal interactions, the ruling did include that damages may be recovered if “an official of the school district who at a minimum has the authority to institute corrective measures on the district’s behalf has actual notice of, and is deliberately indifferent to, the teacher’s misconduct.” http://www.cepi.vcu.edu/newsletter/2010-2011/2011-January-Teacher-Dismissal-For-Unprofessional-Conduct.html. However, no action was taken against the teacher whom the boy had tried to contact for help and instead suggested a measure that was further traumatizing to the victim.

The horrors that this student and others like him may have been subject to have the possibility of being prolonged due to incompetent teachers who do not report an incident once it happens and is not held accountable for the consequences when these events emerge. While Chancellor Walcott’s attempt to stop the abuses by terminating all the teachers who may have had substantiated cases of misconduct from the year 2000 may be helpful, it would not have helped in the case of Brett Picou or Wilbert Cortez.

What Does The Demographic Have to Do With It?

Amid the outcry of the release of teacher grades in New York City, it has been difficult to understand exactly how the ratings were created and how teachers are graded. Some of the more interesting statistics come from within some of the more widely considered “good” schools. According to “In Teacher Ratings, Good Test Scores Are Sometimes Not Good Enough” by Sharon Otterman and Robert Gebeloff good scores by students do not guarantee a good score for the teacher.
Teachers are compared to other teachers with similar student demographics and scores. This creates situations where teachers in schools with gifted students need by than good results, they need exceptional results. The City of New York did acknowledged the model was “too sensitive” for the teachers who had either very good or very bad scores. One reason for this is the formula used to create the scores – it has expectations.
There was one situation where the formula being used assigned a teacher working at an esteemed school on the Upper West Side a zero, the lowest possible score, because of expectations. The teacher’s students scored 1.22 standard deviations above the mean, but the expectations were for the students to be 1.84 standard deviations above the mean. Obviously, there are some kinks in the formula that need to be worked out.
The system currently implemented has its problem, but at least it is trying. At least there is some sort of public accountability – much better than no accountability at all. As a student in the public school system I do believe it is important for teachers to be held to some level of responsibility. Without it what would we come to? Anyone could be a teacher, which should not be the case. New York City and its citizens are investing money into the students. Almost half of all Americans live within 50 miles of their birthplace; meaning the more successful a student is the more likely they are to come back to New York City and create a company, create jobs, or even donate money. It is imperative to create some sort of accountability for teachers; whether this is the correct way to do it is debatable, but it must be done.

Do These Accessments Hold Any Value?

            The last decade has not been a good one for education. Although standards-based education has been implemented for the last twenty years, it has come to the forefront, especially when George W. Bush issued No Child Left Behind. This act determined that education can be improved by setting high standards and establishing goals that would document a child's progress. Resultantly, assessments were made to be given mandatorily in order to access children's growth in grades. Schools that failed to do so faced a decrease in their budgets, making administrators and teachers accountable by tying their livelihoods with the success of their students.

            To make things worse, the Obama administration has initiated its Race to the Top act in an effort to further reform the public school education system. This act rewards states that comply with federal requirements such as performance-based standards for teachers, following nationwide standards, etc. This act can almost be deemed a copout. In a nation that is recuperating, or more like trudging, from a recession, individual states have very stretched budgets. There is an undeniable appeal behind government promises to provide funding for these states. Following California, New York is the second state to engage in this tradeoff: additional funding for a monetarily deficit state in exchange for national integration of education. On February 24th, New York state released the assessments of tens of thousands of teachers, provoking an outrage among those that work in the educational department.

            These assessments are mathematical in formula. These reports cover a span of three years and predict how well students will do based on their ethnicity, gender, income level, etc. The teacher's success in his or her evaluation depends mostly  the test scores of students and how much they have exceeded or failed standards. If students do well, ratings go up. If students fail, ratings go down. Ironically, although these reports are mathematical in nature, they have a wide range of possible imprecision.

            The emphasis is on the success of the students which determine the good/bad ratings that teachers might receive. This is an unfair basis for teacher appraisal because there are a plethora of outside conditions that might influence students on test days. It can be something as simple as a bad day or something more intricately serious, such as their home lives. Sometimes, the problems lie with the teachers. Just like their students, teachers can be exposed to the same problems. As people, it is normal for good and bad things to happen. Otherwise, how would we distinguish the two? Yet, it makes no sense to mechanize and label the success of teachers and students because such a thing depends on a mix of personal and circumstantial factors. Teachers and students are flesh and blood, not machines. Between both parties, relationships are bound to grow. Teachers will come to regard some students warmly and vice-versa.

            The methods of these audits must also be looked at. How well a teacher teaches their students cannot be discerned from the standardized tests that they take. With that said, there have been recent administrative evaluations done personally on teachers. The basis of these evaluations, whether a teacher can come to par with the standards that are expected from them, are flawed. The relationships between a teacher and his or her class is one of familiarity. For administrators to come in and attempt to observe candidly cannot work. Their presence disrupts and distorts the mood. Teachers and students will behave differently than they normally would in an effort to mask their shortcomings. On the chance that teachers were informed ahead of time, there is still a problem. One evaluation cannot be enough. For a teacher to be effectively assessed, they must be repeatedly observed, day after day, for an extended period of time in order to grasp some idea of their standings. However, there is no available manpower or patience to attempt such a task. Some sort of surveillance can be installed but that causes a whole other controversy over the violation of human rights, especially in a classroom environment. There has been recent rumors of student-based evaluations of teachers. However, I cannot view that as anything short of disastrous. Students cannot be a reliable source simply because they are so prone to following their whims. Human bias cannot be effectively separated from indifferent criticisms. If teachers and students get off on the wrong foot, there is no reason for the students to grade the teachers fairly. Similarly to Daniel, I also attended a magnet middle school. M.S. 158 is the fellow brethren of M.S. 67. The perceptions of teachers that the magnet class had differed radically from that of the other classes, even S.P. The teachers that we found informative and helpful were labeled as horrid and ineffective by those classes. Perception is power. In addition, the balance of power between the two groups will be radically shifted. Educational authority will be severely undermined by the constant threat of receiving an unsatisfactory assessment. There is no correct way to evaluate how well our teachers are doing. But if there's any use these reports have, it's that there are more than enough ways to access teachers incorrectly.

            Conclusively, This disturbing trend of conforming to standardized testing, this process of mechanizing schools, is made even more disturbing once one realizes how much the government is advocating it. Where is the line between federal help and interference? The United States has always had a problem distinguishing the boundaries between the independence of states and the deferment to the federal government. At the rate this is going, it seems that we might soon have our answer. 

Education Evaluation

       Over the last decade, new policies and regulations have been implemented by the government to try and ensure a higher quality of education in America. State tests are administered, schools are given ratings, and most recently, teacher evaluations (data reports) of almost 18,000 New York City teachers have been revealed to the public. Many of the reports released have a margin of error as great as 75% and yet, many parents, students, and prospective employers may look at them and take them for face value. These reports contain student test results and compare them the previous test results. If improvement is made, teachers generally receive better assessments, but if the results are worse, then the opposite occurs. Factors such as school location or mental state of the student’s mind aren’t even accounted or represented within the test results.

        These assessments are only a preview of what is to come for the New York City public school system. Come this Fall 2012, a more thorough report of teacher evaluations will be given, with potential student survey as an added aspect. I think that teachers should be rated and assessed because it helps rule out the teachers who are not doing a sufficient job, from the one’s who are making an impact on student’s lives. I do not however, believe that these rating systems are going to necessarily yield results, which are accurate. In fact, I believe that adding student survey may add bias to the evaluations and misconstrue the data for many teachers. An easy grading teacher, who does not necessarily teach students his/her students well, may receive better survey results, as opposed to a teacher who is a tough grader, but teaches with proficiency.

           The objective of a teacher, in my opinion, should be to develop a student who is not only ready to take a standard exam, but who is also well-rounded, has a thorough understanding of concepts, and thinks at a higher level. From my experience, (as a public school student for the last 11 years) is that the teachers who I’ve learned from the most, have strived to not only limit me to state standards and excel on exams, but also made me want to learn more. I’m not sure about how to exactly go about improving our school systems, but I think that it will require a lot more reliable and accurate data before we come to conclusions about what we need to improve on.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/susan-ochshorn/teacher-data-reports_b_1304237.html

Student Input

On Tuesday’s class we discussed the NYC education system, zeroing in on the recent teacher grading system. This method of evaluating teachers is considered flawed since teachers are being rated on one exam their students took. Like I also mentioned in class, a student may have a bad day and thus do poorly. But this is directly affecting the teacher, and the teacher has no control over what happens to the student on testing day. I had also said that teachers who were rated poorly might not always be the worse teachers, as I have felt from previous experience. I suggested that teachers should be measured by their impact on their students, either negatively or positively.

But I also think that students should be more heavily looked upon as a factor for success on an exam. Sometimes our teachers are not the most competent educators, but students still succeed. Now, the teacher will receive a good score without doing anything. It will give everyone a false impression. From prior experiences, if I had a teacher who barely taught, I worked by myself to get the good grades. Why should I have to sacrifice my grades and potential future for a person who does not care what I am doing? I would get the scores for myself, not for my teacher’s records. Plus, there is a sort of overwhelming satisfaction with doing well without a teacher’s presence. There are many students and parents who will go to great lengths to make sure their kids do well, even if it means spending thousands on tutors and enrichment books.

This is not to say that every student should fill out a survey to determine the amount of actual learning that takes place in a classroom. Like what was said in class, students not always objective; those who are favored by a teacher are more likely to be bias for the teacher, or vica versa. But I do believe that students should have some impact on a teacher’s ratings. Sometimes I feel that students know more of what is going and what needs to be changed than people of higher authority do.

Also, it was mentioned that students who become inspired to do well because of their teachers would perform better on an exam. Personally, I am just a bad test taker. It does not matter how motivated I am to do well or how much I know about the topic being tested, anxiety takes over. I am sure that I am not the only person who feels this way.

Delay in civil trial over 2010 Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill Reminds the Need for an Alternate Energy Source

It can be disputed whether an alternate primary energy source for the Untied States is worth pursuing. This country’s reliance on oil is heavy, sometimes too heavy. During our class’s discussions on alternate energy sources the topic of practicality was often brought up. Although it may be quite difficult, and not always cost effective up front, it still seems to be an urgent goal. The conversation on alternate energy was stemmed from a greater conversation on global warming. The effect of climate change on the world is not easily disputed with a sound mind. The extent and speed of the effects of climate change can be debated though. What cannot be argued is the damage the BP oil spill caused in April 2010. The oil spill in the Gulf Coast not only hurt the wildlife in the waters and the surrounding lands but also the lives of many, especially Americans in New Orleans. The horrors of the BP oil spill have been revisited by the media because of the pending civil trial. BBC reported on February 26 in an article titled “BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill trial delayed for a week” http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-17171396 talked about the spill. The article reminds the reader of some of the pressing quotes regarding the oil spill, “US President Barack Obama called the spill ‘the worst environmental disaster the nation has ever faced.’” The article writes that the trial would start March 5 right now. This will surely bring the terrors of the oil spill back into media’s spotlight. Many of the defendants in this case from New Orleans, some of whom lost their close ones to the spill and many who lost significant business because of what the oil did to the waters want this case to proceed to trial. The New York Times published an article on the same day as BBC in regards to the delay. Quotes throughout the article explain how the people making up the Plaintiffs’ Steering Committee at this point just want the trial to go to trial. They want the truth to be exposed about BP. One cannot feel the aches and pains these citizens are still experiencing as a result of this disastrous oil spill. Furthermore, it must be examined whether the United States want to risk another catastrophic oil spill. With gas prices being rumored to reach a record five dollars per gallon and the prices only went up in the days and weeks after the oil spill, it must be questioned whether oil is the right choice. We already know that oil is terrible for the world, with global warming affecting the Earth at a pace difficult to predict, but we cannot overlook that oil is also posing a threat to the nature and to peoples livelihoods. Yes, it does provide jobs to many at the same rate, but so can an alternate energy source like solar or wind energy. Higher fuel economy cars might make a citizen feel good about them and their wallet but the car is still using oil, which is still hurting the Earth and still the many affected by the BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill.

Russia and China Block More Than Just a UN Proposal

As the violence grows in Syria the cries from the citizens of the nation grow louder. They are wondering where the big friendly nations of the United States and European nations like France and England are to help them with the violence. Daily reports of even more killings in Homs and around the war-stricken nation have prompted discussion from not only activists but also the media and the U.S. government. In the article, “Nations Press Halt in Attacks to Allow Aid to Syrian Cities” by Steven Lee Myers http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/25/world/middleeast/friends-of-syria-gather-in-tunis-to-pressure-assad.html?scp=1&sq=nations%20rebuke%20leader%20of%20syria%20as%20assault%20rages&st=cse found in the New York Times Saturday, February 25 cites how upset the U.S. is in, especially the Secretary of State, Hillary Rodham Clinton. “It’s quite distressing to see two permanent members of the Security Council using their veto when people are being murdered: women, children, brave young men,” Clinton said as reported by Myers. Russia and China with their overriding vetoes of the proposition by the United Nations to help out in Syria have proved to be two world powers who do not want certain actions to be condemned in this Middle Eastern nation. As Myers discusses in his article, their are worries of providing Syrians with weapons so that they can properly defend themselves from the President Bashar al-Assad led violence. Myers concludes his article with that Republican senators McCain and Graham along with independent Lieberman are in favor of suppling the Syrian people with weapons. This makes sense because of the tendency for Republicans to be loud supporters of the second amendment, the right to bare arms. This amendment stemmed from the writers of the constitution remembrance of the help weapons played in gaining their freedom from the oppressive English government. Now, Republicans steadily support this cause although Russia and China do not think so. These two countries have their own agendas though: China is currently run under an oppressive communist government and Russia is in the middle of political debate on who should run this once socialist nation. For either nation to support the opposition to have rights to arms would undermine their own regimes. Furthermore, speculation continues to grow, as displayed in an increasing amount of articles on reasons why Russia and China are against these resolutions. Russia supplies Syria with weapons while Syria returns the favor with giving them oil. China as stated above have their own reason not to support rebellion, even if it means turning a cheek to the inhumane acts the government is committing. More so, as said in Myers’ article, “‘We want from them deeds and actions, not more condemnations and promises,’ said Abdul Rahman,” Syrian protestors want more than words from nations like the U.S. Reportedly the Red Cross has started to help out in Syria, particularly in Homs but their is only so much they can do without the strong backing of the United States and European nations. Unfortunately it seems these nations are worried of future conflict in the Middle with not only a possible nuclear war between Israel and Iran, with Iran having possible alliances with Syria, but also how Russia and China will side on these actions the revolting Middle East nations are taking. Each day brings new news to the front page of newspapers in the U.S. and Europe, this kind of media pressure seems that it will force the governments of these nations to act shortly despite those two vetoes from Russia and China.

Introduction to the Education (Topic) Discussion:

Most recently, there has been great commotion in the educational sector of our communities due to the disclosure of controversial “ratings” of nearly 18,000 New York City teachers. This was brought on due to a movement that started in 2010, in which The Times and other news organizations requested this information under the Freedom of Information Law. The United Federation of Teachers then sued to block their release and the case made its way to the state’s highest court. There, it was determined that this information could in fact be released – one of the judges who ruled on it said imperfection was no reason to hide the data. The ratings, known as teacher data reports, cover three school years ending in 2010, and are intended to show how much value individual teachers add to a school by measuring how much their students’ test scores exceeded or fell short of expectations based on demographics and previous performance. These “value-added assessments” are increasingly being used in teacher-evaluation systems, but they are an imprecise science. “In simple terms, value-added models use mathematical formulas to predict how a group of students will do on each year’s tests based on their scores from the previous year, while accounting for factors that include race, gender, income level and other test results. If the students surpass expectations, their teacher is rated well — “above average” or “high” under New York’s models. If they fall short, the teacher is rated “below average” or “low.” What many teachers point out is that the scores cannot account for many other factors: distractions on test day; supportive parents or tutors; allergies; a dog continually barking near the test site. There are also schools where students are taught by more than one teacher, making it hard to discern individual contributions. (The reports released by the city gave the same rankings to those teachers.)” The ratings released on Friday are also more than a year old and are based on test results that have been somewhat discredited, since the state later readjusted the scoring. For these and many other reasons, the margin of error in these ratings varies greatly. In some cases, it is as low as 35% (for math teachers) but in others, the margin of error is as great as 75%. Still, they offer a peek at the state’s future evaluation system, which will use value-added measures for at least 20 percent of teachers’ evaluations. “The ratings, which began as a pilot program four years ago to improve instruction in 140 city schools, have become the most controversial set of statistics released by the Bloomberg administration. They came out after a long legal battle and amid anguish and protest among educators; on Twitter posts, some compared their release to a modern-day witch hunt.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/25/education/teacher-quality-widely-diffused-nyc-ratings-indicate.html

http://www.ny1.com/content/top_stories/156586/thousands-of-nyc-teacher-performance-scores-go-public

Another recent occurrence has been the arrest of three teaching staff members who were accused of sexual crimes involving students. On the 16^th, Wilbert Cortez, 49, a computer teacher at P.S. 174, was charged with sexually abusing two male students by touching their genitals and buttocks over their clothes. He was released on $50,000 bail. “A lawyer for Mr. Cortez, Donald H. Vogelman, said his client — who, he said, had no criminal record — intended to fight the case in court. “In my experience,” Mr. Vogelman said, “if the Department of Education has credible evidence that a teacher is a danger to students, they remove that teacher from the classroom. In the year 2000, Mr. Cortez’s case was fully investigated, and a determination was made to put him back in the classroom.””With this, the chancellor of New York City’s schools, Mr. Dennis M. Walcott, has ordered a review of all demonstrated cases of misconduct that date back to 2000 and has promised to remove any teachers who had engaged in sexually inappropriate behavior. These developments came about  when angry parents at Public School 174 in Rego Park, Queens, where the most recently arrested teacher worked, confronted Mr. Walcott during a tense two-hour meeting. “And while Mr. Walcott tried to assure parents that the safety of their children was of paramount concern, the city’s public advocate, Bill de Blasio, said in a letter to the chancellor that the city’s overall response had been lacking. “I do not understand how the existence of previous inappropriate conduct does not trigger automatic, ongoing oversight; the absence of such actions by the Department of Education suggests negligent oversight and a failure of accountability,” he wrote.” The special commissioner of investigation for the school system, Richard J. Condon, said that there were 66 substantiated cases involving a sexual allegation in 2011 but this includes a broad range of cases, including sexual harassment of employees, and the Education Department could not immediately say how many had involved inappropriate behavior with students.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/18/education/walcott-vows-dismissal-of-anyone-sexually-abusing-students.html?pagewanted=print

And yet another controversy with our educational system, the New York City Department of Education recently released the findings of a year-long audit. “At some city high schools, red flags popped up as soon as the Department of Education started looking at data used to calculate whether students should get a diploma. When auditors looked closely at 53 schools, they found almost 300 students who graduated in 2010 that shouldn't have.” These findings serve to suggest that claims made by Mayor Michael Bloomberg which indicated that improvements in the city’s graduation rate were being made due to his school reforms, may not be entirely reliable.  Aaron Dallas of Teachers College stated that: “The big suspicion is schools are making mistakes that are a result of the pressures of this field, in order to boost their graduation rates and their credit accumulation rates, and what this audit is claiming is that most of the time these mistakes are in fact inadvertent. Now that doesn't really absolve the department of making sure that people know the rules.” The DOE is not going to go back and revoke diplomas from the several hundred graduated students who the audit identified as short on requirements but it is making several major policy changes. The biggest shift may arrive starting the next school year, where high schools will no longer grade their own students' Regents exams. Officials are also tightening requirements for something called "Credit Recovery," a policy that lets students quickly make up credits for classes they failed. For the first time, the DOE is also giving schools a written guide spelling out exactly what students need to earn a diploma.

http://bronx.ny1.com/content/news_beats/education/156548/audit--about-300-public-school-students-graduated-in-2010-without-all-requirements

http://www.nytimes.com/schoolbook/2012/02/23/nine-schools-cited-for-exam-and-credit-irregularities/

Conclusion to The Middle East in Crisis

Last week, as I was typing up the introduction for my topic: The Middle East in Crisis, I came across a published article online, through a quick Google search of “Syria,” entitled: “Syrian Army uses human shields on tanks,” 10:30 a.m. / eastern time, February 12, 2012. Today, I have come across yet another article highlighting the latest acts of violence in the country of Syria entitled “Syria crisis: Deadly shooting at Damascus funeral,” 9:43 a.m. / eastern time, February 18, 2012, in which a funeral in the Mezzeh district of western Damascus that was initially held to bury three youths that were gunned down in the recent acts of violence last week, was interrupted by Syrian forces who shot into the funeral procession, killing one and wounding several others, all due to the recent presence of  a Chinese envoy, with Syrian TV quoting Mr. Zhai (the Chinese envoy) as saying: "The position of China is to call on the government, the opposition and the rebels to halt acts of violence immediately. We hope that the referendum on a new constitution as well as the forthcoming parliamentary elections pass off calmly." However, the opposition in Syria plans to boycott the February 26 referendum, there reason simply being that there is too much violence for the referendum to be held. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-17085226

            The discussions held throughout the course of the week, mostly in regard to the countries of Syria, Iran, and Israel, for lack of a better word, surprised me. On Tuesday, we were able to identify the wrongdoings that all three countries have committed, the violence in Syria, the violence on both the Israeli and Palestinian sides, and the support of Palestinian opposition, through Iran’s unmistakable donation of weaponry and various forms of armaments. On Friday, I feel, was when everyone really brought things to perspective as we shared our thoughts and ideas across the table. Without these discussions, I feel that I would have still held this biased view that was, for the most part, unmerited. The most surprising fact that I took away from these discussions was the attitude that America has for countries in crisis, as best put by Mr. Bonamo. The United States will only really participate in human intervention whenever a crisis involving human rights violations are beneficial to them, especially when referencing our involvement in the country of Libya. Everyone was for the end of Muammar Gaddafi’s reign, and so we helped the opposition by bombing the city of Tripoli and thus giving the civilians a chance at taking their country’s future into their hands, for the sake of peace. Now although that’s all well and good, the same cannot be said for the country of Syria. The possibilities of an all-out nuclear war, as discussed previously in class, almost entirely silenced the urgency I had for the United States government to get involved. However, I feel that if a Chinese envoy has the guts to try and diffuse the 11 month crisis in the country of Syria (although Assad’s suppressing regime has been in effect for nearly fifty years and counting), although for the best interest of the government and not so much the civilians, we too can partake in intervening with the situation in that country.

            It’s a big mess in the Middle East. Whereas in Libya the opposition was clear cut and easy to perceive, the state of affairs in that region of the world, as best put by Mr. Bonamo, again, is like “little chess pieces,” meaning that it is so complex and intricate that it is hard to tell whose on whose sides to begin with, and what intentions each country truly has in regards to sovereignty and state power. I’m very grateful for everyone’s effort in discussing a topic I hold very dearly to my heart, not only for the country of Syria, but for the sake of all the other civilians living in the Middle East that are caught in the crossfires between these powerful and very influential nations. I feel that if one outsider, albeit a news reporter as a form of mass media, or even just an individual who doesn’t know much about the topic or is unaware of the crisis occurring in the Middle East region, was present in room 301 during our Tuesday and Friday discussion, would be surprised and well informed by what was brought to the table, and the beautiful ideas that everyone conjured up that both answered and questioned our presence in the country of Syria, and our involvement with other Middle Eastern countries, and the relationships we both fostered and potentially severed throughout the turn of the twenty-first century. I will end this conclusion with the gist of what most people wrote in their blogs on Wednesday night. I hope the country of Syria will end its violence on her people, that a new implemented constitution will end the rusty suppression of that regime, which has been around for over fifty years, and only surfaced through the murky waters of the Middle East just last year, and that Iran, Israel, and the Palestinians share a dialogue, and end their senseless violence regarding power, authority, sovereignty, and the Biblical old fight for land, as well.    

China, Russia, and Syria

Our discussion on Tuesday about Syria and the threat of possible nuclear weapons made me open my eyes to the possibilities of American intervention under the pretense of the United Nations. However, the problem arose that China and Russia may not allow this to happen and that they have blocked intervention because they don't want the US or Britain to gain power there or influence. We also explained that Syrians might see the intervention as a ploy to westernize them and Pan-Arab-ism might arise as the surrounding lands support those who are being "invaded".

                                                                                    

In one article from the Ethiopian Review, http://www.ethiopianreview.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=35653&start=0&sid=d1e34387ec98b043b4890da78d260dd9 the author relays the given facts about the two sides and the background information to help the reader. First, from the view of the UN and the United States, the Syrian resolution was a way to express support for the Arab league proposal that would call for the Syrian President Bashar al Assad to step down from power.

                                                                    

However, both China and Russia vetoed the resolution and the US did not take it as lightly. The fact that both regimes veto the resolution shows that the relationship between the two marks the emergence of prohibition on Syria and the lands beyond. Russia did send the Russian foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, to Damascus to talk with Syrian leadership. And China and Russia seem justified in assuming suspicions of the policies because of how the intervention in Libya went. The UN intervened on the threat of mass murder of their enemies and they interpret that as acting on the basis of fear. Their view is that there should not be intervention based solely on suspicion of intent. This could be the preface to more aggressive resolutions to come and thus they do not want for there to be a precedent for the Western world to work off of; it sets a “permanent principle of international law that they oppose”.

Learning this enlarges my understanding of the situation and I feel more able to make an informed decision as to why I side with the group I do and how I can weigh the pros and cons in relation to each other. In another article, I examined the responses of other countries to whatever is going on in Syria and China and Russia. The Saudi Arabian King Abdullah, condemns Russia and China for vetoing the legislation. In translation, the King leaves us with a few words: “The world is ruled by brains by justice, by morals and by fairness.” (http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/11/world/middleeast/in-rare-blunt-speech-saudi-king-criticizes-syria-vetoes.html?_r=1&scp=2&sq=russia%20and%20china,%20syria&st=cse).

The reasons that Russia and China give for why they didn’t allow the resolution to happen, proves sound as does the argument for why the UN and specifically the United States want to get in there and help those people like.