NEWS RELEASE: In The Wake Of 6 Days Missed Instruction From Hurricane Ike; KISD Keeps Pulling Those Teachers Out Of The Classroom: Part 1

 

Katy I.S.D. pulled 43 certified junior high math teachers from 12 different campuses out of their classrooms on December 2 so they could attend a district-training session on block scheduling, held at the Leonard Merrell Center.

Students in the 43 classrooms were taught that day by 6 substitutes who had no college degree, 25 substitutes who had college degrees but no teacher certification, and 12 substitutes who were certified teachers but not necessarily in math. (The District did not provide the subject of certification of these teachers.)

District patrons may well want to remember that six days of instruction time were lost during the current 2008-09 academic year because of Hurricane Ike.

The information on the December 2 training session was provided at no cost to George Scott Reports (GSR).  However, the District wants to charge $648,000 to provide GSR with comprehensive data which would allow a substantive analysis of the District’s overall employee training program.

The District estimates that there have been 12,000 training sessions since 2006, although that statement did not clarify whether these were sessions just for teachers or all training sessions.

The information sought and provided regarding the December 2 training session of junior high school math teachers included the following:

• The name of the classroom teacher
• The campus of the classroom teacher
• The pay grade of the classroom teacher
• Confirmation of certification status
• The name of each teacher’s substitute
• The pay grade of each teacher’s substitute

Although we have the names, GSR does not include the names of the teachers or the substitutes in its report.  “It was important for us to get real names.  It is not journalistically relevant that we report the names,” Scott said.  See table here

The District’s initial response to GSR verifies what was sought.

“On December 2, 2008, we received your two separate requests for records.  After discussing it with you on the phone, your request was narrowed to be a request the following information for the current school year (PIR 08122554-40) and the 2007-08 school year (PIR 0812255-40) to include “the training sessions that are the subject of the requests are for those involving classroom teachers and only those held during the academic year which required classroom teachers to be pulled from their teaching duties to receive the training.” To include with each request “names of the teachers and substitutes as well as certifications and pay grades are integral parts of the requests.”

“The District will provide a computer printout of training sessions in a very condensed format that will not permit serious, qualitative analysis of the training sessions,” George Scott said.

Here’s the portion of the District’s response that verifies this.

“I have not received the number of trainings held each year but have been told there are approximately 12,000 trainings in the system since 2006 for approximately 4000 – 5000 a year. Some of these trainings may not meet your criteria as set out. To find this out, individual trainings will need to be pulled and assessed.

A less expensive way to do this would be to withdraw your requests above and request a list of trainings with dates and times and number of attendees for the years in question. Upon receiving this data, you could determine which trainings you would like the list of names for. I could then give you a data base of all teachers with the information requested.

The substitute list would be a little more difficult as it is a separate system and each individual day would have to be pulled. Then I could get a list of all substitutes with their daily rates on it. You would have to cross reference the data.  This is much like the way I did it this time for you. It took approximately 3 hours to gather all the information and another hour for me to put it together for you.  

The cost for the list of trainings only (including dates, time, and number of attendees) will be $45.00 or less. I will waive the overhead charge. The list will contain every training the District has done since the system was put in place. I can remove the ones prior to the dates on your request if you would like.”

 “This project started with a limited objective to try to find out how often classrooms teachers were being taken out of the classroom during the academic year,” Scott said.  “The second part of the project was to determine if there were any standards of evaluation put in place by the District’s Board,” Scott said.

Scott said GSR became aware of the December 2 training session because there are a growing number of classroom teachers throughout Katy I.S.D. (particularly math) who have discovered that “my report is not their enemy.  As they read my columns, classroom teachers are coming to understand that part of my effort is to help them.”

 “This conference was apparently particularly offensive and demeaning to some math teachers, who balked at initial instructions from their administration that they were going to need to attend,” Scott said.  “Teachers were apparently told that there were 50 slots that needed to be filled.  It is interesting to note that only 43 teachers are shown as having attended.”

 The basic materials that were distributed at the December 2 session are provided in PDF format by the link below.  The session and the materials were purportedly designed to enhance teachers’ ability to handle block scheduling more effectively.

Link to agenda and overhead slides for training

Block scheduling is created when an individual teacher has the same students for the equivalent of two consecutive classes, in either the same subject (math) or correlated subjects (reading and language).

Consistent readers of GSR know that the Report has used the Public Information Act of Texas to force the District to acknowledge in writing that it has no management process in place to evaluate the effectiveness of its curriculum initiatives (such as differentiated instruction, teacher-teaming, block scheduling, Professional Learning Community, KMAC, etc. ).

 “We have published the handouts from the session for three basic reasons.  The first is to allow the public to walk inside the top-down management shoes in which classrooms teachers walk,” Scott said.  “The second is to give you a first hand look at the kinds of material that public education curriculum administrators call “training”.  The third is to encourage classroom teachers to keep calling and writing me.  I may be the only real advocate you have in this town.”

“This District is allocating literally millions of dollars in taxpayer resources on instructional philosophies and training for which there is no evidence that these efforts produce improved student academic performance,” Scott said.  “I am sensing a growing unrest among teachers in Katy I.S.D. at the kind of hostile working environment that the Katy I.S.D. School Board has allowed to be created.”

“It is becoming increasingly clear that the Katy I.S.D. School Board does not believe that it has any role whatsoever to perform in holding Supt. Alton Frailey and his administration accountable for its curriculum and training initiatives,” Scott said.  ”I am still waiting to discover one important indication or one relevant piece of information that would contradict that conclusion.”

 “I hope that citizens in Katy will begin calling the local newspapers and encouraging those publications to rediscover the concept of journalism,” Scott said.  “It is apparent in the District’s response that GSR has struck the tip of the iceberg.  It sure would be valuable to have print newspapers actually practice real journalism.”

“Because we have come across the tip of the iceberg with the Dec. 2 training session, we are going to pay for that condensed version of the 12,000 training sessions,” Scott said.  “Who knows where that will lead?”

READ PART 2 OF THIS REPORT