The New Orleans model

The privateers' feeding frenzy is on in post-Katrina New Orleans. Chief privateer Paul Vallas, with KIPP as his model, is trashing experienced teachers and replacing them with KIPPies—young, uncertified, low-paid, inexperienced TFAers who will work 16-hour days with no collective bargaining rights—that is, until they leave the profession in 3 years. According to Sunday's Times-Picayune:

The Recovery School District in New Orleans will slash about 17 percent of its teaching force by terminating close to 180 teachers, librarians, math coaches and other staff members by Tuesday…About 260 other staff members fall into a "surplus" pool that principals can tap. Those in the surplus pool could stay at their schools or move into other positions. About three-quarters of that batch include certified teachers, math coaches, in-house substitutes, clerical staff and others whose positions were eliminated through school closings, elementary grade reconfigurations and principals' requests.

Vallas said he is comfortable with the new model -- which mostly mirrors the framework of the charter school operator Knowledge is Power Program…

Inside Chicago's Renaissance

In Vallas' previous haunt, Chicago, the Daley/Duncan regime is being lauded by the Sun-Times for improving the quality of the CPS teaching force and for recruiting a "higher caliber of new hires."

Over six years, CPS dramatically improved the quality of its teaching force, driven by higher caliber new hires, according to a study by the Illinois Education Research Council at Southern Illinois University at Edwardsville.

I'm not sure what "higher caliber" means exactly. I hope it doesn't mean more young, white suburbanites. Let's look into that one.

Yes, let's give credit where credit is due. The number of candidates per available Chicago teaching job has greatly increased. But this may also be due to a worsening economy and thousands of teachers having their positions cut and neighborhood schools being replaced by privately-managed charters hiring younger, mainly uncertified teachers. Economic uncertainty and hard times in suburban districts also means that city teachers think twice before giving up their Chicago teaching job for greener suburban pastures.

Still, as the editorial points out:

Teachers with the best credentials are among the most likely to leave the neediest schools, research shows. Anywhere from 74 percent to 79 percent of those teachers are gone after five years, according to a report that tracked Illinois teachers though 2006, also by IERC.

As for raising teacher quality through merit pay and mentorship, the Chicago New Teachers Center is trying to provide every new teacher with a mentor. But, is there really money in the budget to do that in a meaningful way?

A University of Chicago report found that less than 13 percent of novice teachers in 2005 reported getting intensive support -- the kind of help that dramatically increases the odds of them staying in education and at their particular school.

That's 13 percent—a decade after the Mayor took over the school system. And the S-T editorial offers no evidence that merit pay has produced anything except more emphasis on test-prep. Maybe it's too soon for the communications dept. to start dropping these celebration stories in editorial board meetings.