District of Columbia: Education Reform: Discussion Space

June 11, 2007

Teacher Section - Improving Public Schools

The Mayor is traveling to each ward to talk with residents about what they think would make public education work better. You may not have been able to attend one of his Education Town Hall Meetings, but the Mayor still wants your input.

What would you respond to the following questions?

1. What should be the top 3 early action priorities for improving DCPS and public education?

2. How can we ensure that schools are safe and provide a good environment for learning in DCPS and other public schools?

3. How can parents, guardians, and community members be best involved in DCPS and public education?

Posted at 9:14:25 AM | Topics: Teacher/Educator Discussion

As a UDC professor, I would like to see a section devoted especially to higher education. Although the issues facing UDC are critically related to those facing K-12 schools, how these issues are handled at the college level will, in many ways, differ significantly. How students fare in college have direct impacts on the future of the city's quality of life, the nation's economy, and more importantly, our ability to compete in the global economy.

When will the educators of DCPS be informed of all of the changes in administrators, supervisors and superintendents. Why do we have to wait on the newspapers to report who has left the school system and who is still there?

1.Some early action priorities for improving DCPS should include renovations and repairs of school buildings. Many of the schools in the system still function without air conditioners in the classrooms during the warm weather months and no consistant heat in the cold weather months. My school has operated for two school years without running water in all of the bathrooms. Some sinks do not work properly, so parents and teachers bought handsanitizer to ensure that thier hands are clean. Some supplies and resources are not available and principals, teachers and students are still expected to perform well. If a school is in corrective measures or in needs of improvement and the school system asks what the school needs as far as teacher support, student services or resouces, so the system can provide them. Where are they? Why aren't they delivered? What happened to the follow through of services? This must be a priority in order for the students to be successful, teachers to be effective and principals to be supported.
The second immediate action is communication between the mayor & new chancellor and principlas & teachers. Many times principals and teachers don't hear about chnages in their job, rulings that effect the classroom, policies or procedures of DCPS or any other information about changes in the system, until they are posted in the newspaper on the internet. We are supposed to be a team. We, DCPS staff, work for the system but don't know anything about the system until after the fact or by the way. It is an insult to us when we are the ones who have to make the adjustments and deliver high quality instruction and services when we are not communicated to properly.
The third action should be follow through with teacher incentives. The mayor posts losts of programs in the city for teachers and DCPS employees, but there is always a problem. For example, the Teacher Next Door, now called Good Neighbor Next Door program is a great way to promote DC professionals to live in the communities that they work in. However, you can only bid for the properties online. And there are never any properties available. What is the use of this program to revitalize areas with working professionals when the homes are not listed. Teachers provide an immeasurable amount of effort to the rearing of a nation of excellent citizens, yet we get fed the leftovers of what our nation produces.
2. As teachers are nurturers, facilitators, councelors, deligators and play many, many other roles. We can better provide a safe learning evironment if we had a school- wide discipline plan. The plan should be created by DCPS school administrators, a team of teachers, a team of parents and a team of members of the community. As our nation contiues to grow and change, so do our guidelines of what is acceptable behavior. Studies show that mosts teachers leave the classroom because of poor student behavior. There needs to be a better standard of protocol when a student is not following the rules of the school. Teachers have very little authority when it comes to correcting student behavior and many times we don't always have the parental support we need to control this pressing issue.

The top 3 early action priorities for improving DCPS should be to create 1). an open and honest, line of communication from Mayor's office to the classroom. 2). Make sure that the buildings are more than just functional; making the school buildings a place where you wouldn't mind spending 6-8 hours a day. 3). Holding management accountable by surveying the people they are managing.

Many teachers and other ET-15s are threatening daily with their jobs if they dare to speak out about things that need to be corrected in our system.