Teacher turnover, ATRs

At one level, high rates of teacher turnover reflect changes in society and the job market as a whole. But at another, conscious level, high turnover is a carefully cultivated policy practiced by districts, especially urban districts, throughout the country.

We understand. The DoE can’t keep the new teachers it hires.

Older and younger teachers in neighboring classrooms? Sure, it would be good for education. But it would be bad for the DoE’s campaign of control through fear and intimidation.

But now we’re starting to get it. The DoE has no intention of keeping most of them, right from the start.

The ATRs are part of this. A good chunk of them came from District 79. Extracontractually, unilaterally reorganized. Violated excessing rules. Who got nailed? A whole pile of teachers with lots and lots of years.

They are churning the workforce. They are turning teachers over as quickly as they can.

(more beneath the fold) –>Lots of ATRs are from closing schools, mostly high schools. (the UFT has been silent when we have stood up and said no. We support a moratorium on closing schools, but only on paper. This must change.) But back to those teachers. Often the most senior staff members, loyal to their school to the end. And too expensive to get picked up by a new school.

(of course there is no real expense. They get their checks from downtown, same as me. But the anti-teacher shell game FSF penalizes principals for hiring experienced teachers. No savings to the system. But a massive incentive to ATR the 20+ year teachers).

Eventually, if the DoE outmaneuvers our leaders, they could fire ATRs and save money. But a) I don’t think that will happen, and b) I don’t think saving money is their main goal.

They are churning the workforce. They are turning teachers over as quickly as they can.

This has nothing to do with improving education. It has everything to do with fear.

Principals gave up tenure. They get rated by consultants using indecipherable rubrics, beyond the basic idea that test scores must go up. They get dumped into schools where they have no roots. The most senior was recently forced out. The replacements are brand new, no experience, often little or no teaching experience. They have no real authority. They have no security.

And that’s the idea. They live in fear. They live in fear of the arbitrary authority of Tweed.

What Bloomberg has done to principals, he’d like to do to teachers. He’d like to discipline the workforce, with fear. That doesn’t work if teachers stay together over periods of years, if decades worth of experience are passed down. And that’s part of the attack on older teachers. That’s part of the small school-ification, charterfication. That’s part of encouraging as high a turnover rate as they can get.

The last thing the DoE wants is for ATRs to teach, for all that experience to flow back into schools, for older and younger teachers to be in neighboring classrooms. Sure, it would be good for education. But it would be bad for their campaign of control through fear and intimidation.