Certifying Teachers

Re: the article on Certifying Teachers, More by How the Teach in the New York Times today   by Al Baker, on page 1. 

It is accurate that this assessment is better than paper and pencil tests. And, it is accurate that "teaching is action work."   That is why the proposed new assessment system is not nearly as useful, helpful, nor valid as the present practice of student teacher practice and assessment by professionals.  

In this article, Ray Pechone and Linda Darling- Hammond continue their long practice of only telling the positive. And, the writer Al Baker makes the classic error noted in the prior post on media coverage of "reform".

 " Why then in schools do we allow politicians, lobbyists, and other “experts” who are not teachers and have not worked in classrooms for over ten years, and who have not taught children, to make the basic decisions about schooling.  As a starting point, clearly those establishing our policies do not understand testing and its limits.  (See Bracey, 2009).

Teacher Performance Testing - PACT

There is a New York Times article today about Resistance to Outsourcing Teacher Licensing.  Move to Outsource Teacher Licensing Process Draws Protest

... Student teachers at the University of Massachusetts are protesting a new national licensure procedure being developed by the education ...

May 6, 2012 - By MICHAEL WINERIP - Education - Article - Print Headline: "Move to Outsource Teacher Licensing Process Draws Protest"

A group of faculty and students at UMASS Amherst are resisting the assessment system developed and used in California, known as PACT. In the article Prof. Raymond Pecheone of Stanford and others claim there is no organized resistance to this testing.

To the contrary.  A group of faculty and students in the CSU have consistently resisted this testing as invalid and not reliable.  Here is a record of some of this resistance.

https://sites.google.com/site/assessingpact/

Duane Campbell.  Democracy and Education Institute.