Chancellor Interview on ABC - with Diana Wil... I mean, Art McFarlan

What worries me about Cathy Black is how she will handle the data machine that has become the DOE's weapon against teachers (good or bad).

Data can make a sparkling teacher look like  they don't belong in a classroom, they can also make a God awful teacher look amazing.  The unreliability of these data measures begs the question about whether they are worth the time or the money developing in a time of serious economic stress.

What really disturbed me is the blanket statement of concurrence with Joel Klein's work in the past 8 years.  A chancellor who has an understanding of the complex social issues would have the stones to look critically at the biggest social issues of the prior chancellor and would at least make some assurances of effectively addressing those issues during her tenure.  But alas, I ask for too much.

I also have to wonder how well she will recruit teachers to her vision and her mission as chancellor if their work is not supported in the classroom.  So she may want to see a robust and in-depth re-evaluation of curricula, but that's really not possible with the Regents-level standards they have in place.  You can't have it both ways, have a Regents for every subject AND have robust and diverse curricula.  This is something she will not learn unless she looks at a Regents exam or a Regents curriculum and compares that to the robust and diverse curriculum she's looking for, which really worries me.

I can only hope that she lives up to her own expectations that she will do better reaching out to parents, schools, students, and teachers in terms of addressing the concerns that affect the schools.  So rather than going to a school to deliver only bad news, have a chancellor who goes to a school to evaluate the problems and come back with good news on how to address these problems...

But again, I have a feeling that I am asking for too much...