How do i know a schools tier?
Re: How do i know a schools tier?
Don't restrain too much. Your student results might be the key to your contract renewal.
Re: How do i know a schools tier?
My point isn't that everyone wants to be in a pushing-the-limits school. Clearly not, judging from responses above. But some people thrive there. It's their sweet spot.
And that is my point. People want different things, and therefore tiers are subjective.
And that is my point. People want different things, and therefore tiers are subjective.
Re: How do i know a schools tier?
Well said, sid
Re: How do i know a schools tier?
The question is if pushing the limits puts the students in 'sweet spot' as well. It is easy to use buzzwords and say how great a school is just by using a new device or app every year. I'm all for tech, but if the admin can't measure the efficiency of pushing the limits methodology and if it doesn't result in equitable learning, then your pushing has very little meaning to the learner.
Discussion
@Glerky
I agree with @Thames Pirate regarding the general agreement of AS Paris.
@fine dude
Most PD is budget padding. Its a safety margin for leadership, if needed they can reallocate the PD budget without much if any loss of quality in programs.
Most PD is either mandated or uninteresting to ITs.
Most leadership wouldnt know how to collect the data, and the ones that do, dont know what to do with it. What are they going to do if they find out their new PD investment produced no appreciable results. What does that leave them with, going to ownership and saying they were wrong, sorry I wasted the coin, I messed up? In most caes the expense and cost is already lost, either it produces results, or it doesnt, and there is nothing gained from either one, as their is nothing you can do about it, you cant undo the expenditure.
@joe30
Not entirely true, some ISs provide merit/performance based comp in the form of a bonus, award or release time.
@sid
Which is entirely irrelevant to tier status. An third tier IS can be the sweet spot for a particular IT, but that doesnt change the tier status of the IS, its still a third tier IS, merely one the IT is content at.
I agree with @Thames Pirate regarding the general agreement of AS Paris.
@fine dude
Most PD is budget padding. Its a safety margin for leadership, if needed they can reallocate the PD budget without much if any loss of quality in programs.
Most PD is either mandated or uninteresting to ITs.
Most leadership wouldnt know how to collect the data, and the ones that do, dont know what to do with it. What are they going to do if they find out their new PD investment produced no appreciable results. What does that leave them with, going to ownership and saying they were wrong, sorry I wasted the coin, I messed up? In most caes the expense and cost is already lost, either it produces results, or it doesnt, and there is nothing gained from either one, as their is nothing you can do about it, you cant undo the expenditure.
@joe30
Not entirely true, some ISs provide merit/performance based comp in the form of a bonus, award or release time.
@sid
Which is entirely irrelevant to tier status. An third tier IS can be the sweet spot for a particular IT, but that doesnt change the tier status of the IS, its still a third tier IS, merely one the IT is content at.
Re: How do i know a schools tier?
I have worked in schools most would rate T1, T2 and T3 and even zero-rated national schools. Just because a school is regarded as T1 doesn't mean your experience will be better than at a solid T2 school. Higher salaries can often mean a very demanding environment with little if any work-life balance. Personally, I would always prefer a T2 over selling body and soul to be at a so-called T1. There are plenty of so-called reputable schools that trade on their name or brand name and yet act like T3s or worse.
Re: How do i know a schools tier?
PG, that's the crux of the problem and exactly why tiers are subjective. Your definition of a top-notch school is different than mine. Our tiers come out differently. There is usually lots of overlap between one person's criteria and another person's criteria, maybe even there is 80% commonality across most people's criteria, but there is enough different that we cannot all agree.
Your tier system is objective to you. Mine is objective to me. But there is no "our" system that we can all buy into with complete objective confidence.
If we all agreed on the criteria, every teacher would be trying to get into the same school. There's evidence that many of us are interested in the same handful, but also plenty of evidence that sends us in different directions.
Your tier system is objective to you. Mine is objective to me. But there is no "our" system that we can all buy into with complete objective confidence.
If we all agreed on the criteria, every teacher would be trying to get into the same school. There's evidence that many of us are interested in the same handful, but also plenty of evidence that sends us in different directions.
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shadowjack
- Posts: 2140
- Joined: Sat Oct 06, 2012 9:49 am
Re: How do i know a schools tier?
Coming back to this after a few days away - up to 3 pages!
Again, when posters say, "Schools that pay $20,000..." - well, duh! We have bills to pay and need to plan retirements.
But, again, if a school in a city paid 60,000, but was for profit, and the non-profit paid $50,000, I would go for the non-profit $50,000 and so would many of my colleagues at schools I have taught in - at least my colleagues who realize what a job many, if not most, non-profits are to work at. Less pressure to change grades, more pressure to teach well, to keep up to date with current pedagogy, but also more support to do so. More training opportunities. Resources, again. Parents that value you as a partner instead of treating you like a business inferior. The list goes on.
Please stop with the $20,000 and be realistic. If you are making enough money and you know you are going into a great environment, $10,000 is worth it for sparing yourself the stress and hassle.
Again, when posters say, "Schools that pay $20,000..." - well, duh! We have bills to pay and need to plan retirements.
But, again, if a school in a city paid 60,000, but was for profit, and the non-profit paid $50,000, I would go for the non-profit $50,000 and so would many of my colleagues at schools I have taught in - at least my colleagues who realize what a job many, if not most, non-profits are to work at. Less pressure to change grades, more pressure to teach well, to keep up to date with current pedagogy, but also more support to do so. More training opportunities. Resources, again. Parents that value you as a partner instead of treating you like a business inferior. The list goes on.
Please stop with the $20,000 and be realistic. If you are making enough money and you know you are going into a great environment, $10,000 is worth it for sparing yourself the stress and hassle.
Re: How do i know a schools tier?
I've never understood the hand wringing around being 'advised' (or outright told) to change grades. Just log on to the school system, change that 50% to 70%, job done. How does that cause any issue at all with regard to your work life balance? I did it plenty of times in ESL (well, a couple of times, then I just learned to submit 'modified' grades to start out with).
'Pressure to teach well' is far more likely to impact on your work life balance. That's the kind of stuff that ends up in long staff meetings, PD courses, observations with feedback etc. I'm not saying you shouldn't care at all about your teaching but if the school is intent on being a world class education centre then that's going to mean you're doing a lot more work. If a school is just happy to cruise along year to year, that's the kind of conditions where you get to leave at 4pm and not have a bunch of work to do in the evenings and weekends.
'Pressure to teach well' is far more likely to impact on your work life balance. That's the kind of stuff that ends up in long staff meetings, PD courses, observations with feedback etc. I'm not saying you shouldn't care at all about your teaching but if the school is intent on being a world class education centre then that's going to mean you're doing a lot more work. If a school is just happy to cruise along year to year, that's the kind of conditions where you get to leave at 4pm and not have a bunch of work to do in the evenings and weekends.
Re: How do i know a schools tier?
@PG
We'll never know where you have been working nor could we verify your admin exp or credentials. If you are saying the admin spends a ton on PD without meaningfully reflecting on its effect on student learning, then you make no case. Sensible administrators refine PD systems year after year collecting and triangulating data, not live with regret. IB results, SAT scores, and college admissions all could be powerful sources. You can ask the in-house math teacher to do the statistical -. It's not Astrophysics.
We'll never know where you have been working nor could we verify your admin exp or credentials. If you are saying the admin spends a ton on PD without meaningfully reflecting on its effect on student learning, then you make no case. Sensible administrators refine PD systems year after year collecting and triangulating data, not live with regret. IB results, SAT scores, and college admissions all could be powerful sources. You can ask the in-house math teacher to do the statistical -. It's not Astrophysics.
Reply
@sid
No @sid they arent, tiers arent some ITs personal expression of preference, despite what leadership and you admins would like it to be. Its a constructive model just as IB or any curriculum is. There are portions of it that are subjective and portion that are very objective, and just as ITs can disagree on what interdisciplinary is, so do tiers have disagreement on various aspects of a tier.
An IT can enjoy working at a tier 3 IS, they can thrive at a tier 3 IS, and they can have prefer a tier 3 IS, but its still a tier 3 IS. None of those positive qualities increase the tier of the IS.
@fine dude
Thats bunk, most PD is either mandated (and those level 1 IB workshops provide nothing for western trained DTs/ITs), or they are of generally limited interest to ITs, are not implemented well upon returning, or just dont provide much value. The vast majority of ITs and DTs have encountered some new pop.ed reinvention of the wheel with a new name that ends up being the same idea of a decade or more ago.
No @sid they arent, tiers arent some ITs personal expression of preference, despite what leadership and you admins would like it to be. Its a constructive model just as IB or any curriculum is. There are portions of it that are subjective and portion that are very objective, and just as ITs can disagree on what interdisciplinary is, so do tiers have disagreement on various aspects of a tier.
An IT can enjoy working at a tier 3 IS, they can thrive at a tier 3 IS, and they can have prefer a tier 3 IS, but its still a tier 3 IS. None of those positive qualities increase the tier of the IS.
@fine dude
Thats bunk, most PD is either mandated (and those level 1 IB workshops provide nothing for western trained DTs/ITs), or they are of generally limited interest to ITs, are not implemented well upon returning, or just dont provide much value. The vast majority of ITs and DTs have encountered some new pop.ed reinvention of the wheel with a new name that ends up being the same idea of a decade or more ago.
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shadowjack
- Posts: 2140
- Joined: Sat Oct 06, 2012 9:49 am
Re: How do i know a schools tier?
joe30 wrote:
> I've never understood the hand wringing around being 'advised' (or outright
> told) to change grades. Just log on to the school system, change that 50%
> to 70%, job done. How does that cause any issue at all with regard to your
> work life balance? I did it plenty of times in ESL (well, a couple of
> times, then I just learned to submit 'modified' grades to start out with).
>
> 'Pressure to teach well' is far more likely to impact on your work life
> balance. That's the kind of stuff that ends up in long staff meetings, PD
> courses, observations with feedback etc. I'm not saying you shouldn't care
> at all about your teaching but if the school is intent on being a world
> class education centre then that's going to mean you're doing a lot more
> work. If a school is just happy to cruise along year to year, that's the
> kind of conditions where you get to leave at 4pm and not have a bunch of
> work to do in the evenings and weekends.
If you want to work at those kinds of schools, please feel free.
> I've never understood the hand wringing around being 'advised' (or outright
> told) to change grades. Just log on to the school system, change that 50%
> to 70%, job done. How does that cause any issue at all with regard to your
> work life balance? I did it plenty of times in ESL (well, a couple of
> times, then I just learned to submit 'modified' grades to start out with).
>
> 'Pressure to teach well' is far more likely to impact on your work life
> balance. That's the kind of stuff that ends up in long staff meetings, PD
> courses, observations with feedback etc. I'm not saying you shouldn't care
> at all about your teaching but if the school is intent on being a world
> class education centre then that's going to mean you're doing a lot more
> work. If a school is just happy to cruise along year to year, that's the
> kind of conditions where you get to leave at 4pm and not have a bunch of
> work to do in the evenings and weekends.
If you want to work at those kinds of schools, please feel free.
Re: How do i know a schools tier?
@PG
Your can't convince veteran teachers like me with your Trump-esque comments and non-existent admin experience.
Your can't convince veteran teachers like me with your Trump-esque comments and non-existent admin experience.
Re: How do i know a schools tier?
shadowjack wrote:
> If you want to work at those kinds of schools, please feel free.
I just don't see where the 'stress' is coming from my having to alter a few numbers on a spreadsheet.
Whereas I can see the stress that could be placed upon teachers from a school that demands world class education take place within its rooms.
> If you want to work at those kinds of schools, please feel free.
I just don't see where the 'stress' is coming from my having to alter a few numbers on a spreadsheet.
Whereas I can see the stress that could be placed upon teachers from a school that demands world class education take place within its rooms.
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chilagringa
- Posts: 335
- Joined: Sun Apr 24, 2011 7:19 pm
Re: How do i know a schools tier?
I kind of like being expected to provide world-class education to my students. It's a challenge, and challenges make life interesting, and makes me feel like I'm actually, you know, a professional.