Are some Chula Vista teachers sacrificing the well-being of students to their own political goals--and careers?

KPBS has published a story (first story below) about a highly political issue--standardized testing--without mentioning the fact that the featured teacher, Carla Kriss, has been on the Chula Vista Educators' bargaining team since 2008.   I'm guessing that Ms. Kriss failed to mention this fact to the reporter. 

It sounds to me like Ms. Kriss and some of her fellow teachers are intentionally causing students like Abby Eten to become stressed during standardized tests. Why wouldn't the teacher simply smile and tell the child that there's no need for the child to worry, but just to do the best he (or she) can do?

One reason might be to get parents upset so they'll generate a stories favorable to the teachers' goals.

The teachers union is currently threatening to strike in Chula Vista Elementary School District.  One of the big issues for CVE is its opposition to Common Core and standardized testing.

Union politics is a family affair for Carla Kriss.  Her  husband Tim is a former vice-president of the Chula Vista Educators.

Shame on those who make children suffer needlessly to advance the cause of teachers who want to avoid responsibility for student test scores.  Abby Eten reports that she feels like a rubber band that is about to snap.  If the teacher won't ease up on Abby, then Abby's mother should tell her not to worry.

My students always enjoyed standardized tests; kids love a challenge when fear is not involved.  It's abusive to make children suffer so CVE can gain  political power.

Interestingly, the San Diego Union-Tribune has written a story that seems to say that teachers should have no right at all to demand changes from their employers (see second story below).  It's pretty hard to find unbiased reporting in San Diego!


FIRST STORY:

Chula Vista School District Failed To Accommodate Students With Learning Disabilities
by Matthew Bowler
KPBS
September 2, 2014

...Last spring, Chula Vista Elementary School District gave two big tests to its students, and they might have violated state mandates to make testing modifications for students with disabilities.

Testing dominates the school year now. Students like fourth grader Abby Eten feel the stress. Abby said she feels like a rubber band.

“If I keep on stretching it and stretching it, it's going to break,” she said.

Abby has more challenges than other fourth graders: She’s dyslexic. Abby’s mother, Justina Eten, said she’s always surprised by how smart her daughter is...

COMMENTS

skoolteacher

So Ms. Larkins and folks like her are so intent on looking down on and demonizing school teachers (why??) that she is willing to automatically blame one, some, any (??) for the byproducts of the testing cartels (fraud, illegal maneuvering, secrecy, FAILURE) and their lackeys in Congress. What a jerk!


mauralarkins

Dear "skoolteacher":

What a knee-jerk reacation! Certain teachers are fighting standardized tests because they don't want to be evaluated based on their students' progress.

So why don't they come up with an alternative evaluation system for teachers?

Because it would interfere with school politics and the current evaluation system, which is a joke. Most principals don't even both to do classroom observations.

Weak teachers need to be identified and helped. Change is needed, but some teachers are terrified of change.

I am blaming those teachers who intentionally make testing stressful for children in order to achieve political goals.

I don't doubt that there is fraud, illegal maneuvering and secrecy among testing companies, since those things exist in just about every human institution, including school districts and teacher unions.

Of course, I also blame teacher unions for refusing to accept any and all attempts to evaluate teachers effectively.

I don't think weak teachers should be fired, but they do need to be helped. It would be a lot cheaper and more effective if highly-competent teachers were given responsibility for that. The current custom is to pay obscenely-expensive outside vendors to come in and rule the roost for a few years with their supposedly magnificent education programs until everyone realizes they aren't making real improvements.  Here's a recent example of that phenomenon: http://www.latimes.com/local/e...

Politics plays too big a role in selecting teacher leaders. It would be nice if we had a good evaluation system so that teachers who really know what they're doing in the classroom  could be given leadership roles more often. SECOND STORY:



Here's the San Diego Union-Tribune story:

Teachers using students as pawns in Chula Vista

By U-T San Diego Editorial Board

Sept. 3, 2014

Some teachers in the Chula Vista Elementary School District evidently believe that the best way to get a better contract offer from district management is to punish their young students. The tactic should be unacceptable to parents of all 29,000 students at the 45 schools in the district.

Teachers at an unknown number of Chula Vista schools last month began sending letters to parents saying the teachers would not offer any extracurricular or after-school activities until they receive “a new and fair contract.” Rather, the teachers say they will only do what they are specifically contracted to do — seven hours per day — and nothing more...


COMMENTS

Maura Larkins · Top Commenter · UCLA

How else are teachers going to pressure the district? The slowdown is actually a way to avoid a strike, to avoid hurting kids.

Learning about economics and politics firsthand might benefit kids more than a field trip. Most of these kids will be struggling for their own economic survival someday.

That said, I do have a problem with teachers who intentionally inflict pain and stress on their students just because the teachers don't like the new standardized tests.

Some teachers make kids miserable so the parents will oppose standardized tests.

The motivation? These teachers don't want to be evaluated based on student test scores.

In fact, these teachers don't want to be effectively evaluated at all. Why? It would undermine school politics, the lifeblood of the teachers union.

The current system of principal evaluations is a joke. Most principals don't even bother to do classroom observations. The evaluations are usually political. I don't think weak teachers should be fired, but they should be helped.

The current fight in CVESD is just as much about teacher evaluations as it is about money.

Why don’t Manuel Yvellez and his cronies come up with an effective teacher evaluation system, and then use that as a bargaining chip?

Manuel Yvellez

It is rather the District and their spokesperson the UT that is hiding behind children in this dispute. I don't see the Superintendent or his UT supporters volunteering their time to coach a team after school or run a dance class or one the many other after school programs. It is teachers that give of themselves selflessly in this way because of their love of children. Now, feeling unappreciated, they temporarily take away their free volunteer efforts, and they are set upon by the UT as if such voluntary efforts are expected as a mandatory requirement from teachers. And where is the UT Board with their professed great love of children? Why aren't they saying that they will step in with this voluntary effort for a few weeks, to do what teachers do for free year after year?

The suggestion that any teacher in our district is ... See More

Maura Larkins · Top Commenter · UCLA

Hey, CVESD, give the teachers more money--BUT DON'T BACK DOWN ON COMMON CORE.

Pay the teachers for effective performance, and then make sure they're delivering.

Neither the district nor the union seems to want reliable evaluations of teachers.

Neither side is asking for more classroom observations.

Both sides are way too fond of school politics.

Maura Larkins

The Union-Tribune has at times been quite rabid in its support of teachers.

The paper practically hemorrhaged ink for weeks in support of the "Castle Park Five". The school district took quite a beating from the UT in those stories.

Bizarrely, one of the Castle Park Five, teacher Peg Myers, went on to become CVE President before she clambered across the bargaining table in the middle of her term to became a district administrator. It's amazing how enemies can become such good friends. How did Human Resources director Sandra Villegas-Zuniga orchestrate such a reversal? Did Peg, who now calls herself Margaret, suddenly wake up one morning and decide to switch sides for no reason? Obviously, there's more to that story, but I doubt that any news outlet in San Diego will tell it.

I got some information from Anthony Millican about the current bargaining situation. Mr. Millican states:

One of the more misleading slides by CVE at its ongoing parent presentations at schools in our community states that teachers have not had a raise in seven years while the Superintendent’s salary has gone up 11%. Dr. Escobedo’s salary as Superintendent has gone up once, by 4%, since he began serving in the position.

The union is counting restored furlough days as a salary “increase” in alleging that the Superintendent’s salary has gone up 11%. He began in the position with 7 furlough days.

The overwhelming majority of Chula Vista teachers make more in 2014 than in 2007.

That’s because the District paid automatic “step and column” raises (including anniversary increments) annually that ranged from 0% to 4.79% annually; the District-wide average was 2% annually, even during the Great Recession.

Out of 1,225 FTE teachers, approximately 11 give or take can truly claim to have not received a raise in seven years because their years of service put them at the top of the pay schedule for the seven year period. (That’s about 1% who can make a claim of not having had a raise in seven years.)

The union wants an upset populace to influence bargaining about primary pay increases that teachers historically received through “Salary Schedule.” That raise is contractually negotiated, and has not been provided to teachers in nearly seven years. Parents and community members react with surprise when they learn teachers earn two kinds of pay increases. Some would probably be ok with that if the union simply told them the truth.

As it stands, the District has included a 6% salary schedule increase in its latest proposal, part of a wide-ranging package the union’s leadership rejected. The proposed 6% raise is on top of the 2% average automatic raises that went into effect this past July 1. CVE, however, says teachers are entitled to a 10% salary schedule increase, and that the 2% “step and column” automatic raises “don’t count.”

It turns out that the teacher salary of CVE President Manuel Yvellez has increased 17% since 2007, thanks to "step, column, anniversary increments."