Before The School Year Starts

Maybe you have already bought back to school supplies. Maybe you are not a procrastinator. Maybe you are not squeezing the last few days of vacation out of the summer.

But my advice this week, based on my Facebook feed and an email I got from a worried parent, is this:

1. Check the bus schedules, if you expect your child to take the bus, NOW. 

For some Ann Arbor high school students, 
the bus transportation may be 
provided on an Ann Arbor Area Transportation Authority bus.

Don't wait until next Sunday or Monday when everything is closed. If there is a problem (and I have heard about a few), you are much more likely to resolve it before the school year starts if you try to solve it now.

So:
--Look the schedule up (in Ann Arbor: http://a2schools.org//site/Default.aspx?PageID=5392)
--If there is a problem (for instance, if your child would have to walk more than 1.5 miles, or cross a very busy street without a crossing guard or light), then I would suggest doing multiple things:

• Call Transportation and ask for a Router to discuss the problem, in Ann Arbor: (734) 994-2330
• Fill out the Parent Question and Concern Form
• Let the school principal know your concern as well 
• If necessary (if you don't feel like you are getting a resolution) then bump up your concern to the Superintendent and the Board of Education.

And by the way, it helps to know your rights: you can read the Ann Arbor Transportation Policy in Board Policy 3760.R.01 which can be found in Board Docs. 

2. Did your child have a crummy year last year? Are you worried that will happen again? Take Action Now. For instance: 

It's OK to request a meeting: Summer vacation is over for teachers and principals--you should feel free to write an email or place a phone call asking for a meeting. (If it's simple, maybe you don't need a meeting--but anything complicated, ask to get on the schedule!) Don't feel badly about asking to meet with the principal or with teachers or counselors--they are there to help you problem-solve. If you have complicated/multiple issues, it may help for you to describe the problems in advance--but that is not a requirement. It is better to ask earlier, before the school year is well underway.

Is it possible that your child's difficulties are due to an undiagnosed learning disability or other issue that would be covered by special education statutes and would qualify your child for additional services? Sometimes (not always) a telltale sign for this, is that your child did well in elementary school because they are smart, but as the work (and school day) gets more complex, they have trouble with a specific class or classes (even though they seem to be trying); they have trouble organizing (even though they are trying); all of a sudden they are failing classes.
If you have been wondering about whether your child would qualify for additional services under an IEP or 504 plan, it is your right to request an evaluation. (You can also have someone do an evaluation for you at your expense.) Once you request an evaluation, the school district is "on the clock" to provide it--so it really is in your interest to request this early. 

3. There Are Resources To Help You!

In addition to teachers, principals, and counselors, don't forget that other parents have a wealth of knowledge. If you are new to the school, the PTO is a great place to start.

If you have issues with special education or truancy, the Student Advocacy Center can be a great resource for you. It has Sample Letters for requesting an evaluation or disputing decisions around special education.

Another great resource in Ann Arbor is the Ann Arbor Parent Advisory Committee for Special Education (AAPAC for short), a group of parents that have children who receive special education services and who work to improve services to kids. They have experienced parents who are often liaisons to specific schools, and they have regular meetings as well.
[Note: some of the other districts have similar groups as well.]

The Michigan Alliance for Families has a parent mentor available to all parents in public schools (that includes charter schools) who can be very helpful--for instance, reviewing an IEP to see if it addresses the concerns that an evaluation might raise.

Consider subscribing to Ann Arbor Schools Musings by Email!

Please Take the M-STEP Student and Parent Surveys

The Michigan Department of Education has put out parent and student surveys on the M-Step. I understand (at least on the parent survey) there is a comment section where you can put text. Use it!


Take the survey for students by June 12, 2015.

Take the survey for parents by June 19, 2015.



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Ann Arbor Chronicle Column: Students and the Body Politic

Do you spend your time thinking about what it means to have a free press?

Then you might like my latest column for the Ann Arbor Chronicle: Student Press and the Body Politic.

And in this column, I talk a lot about the Washtenaw Community College Voice, the Dexter High Squall, the Community High School Communicator, and...my hometown high school newspaper, the Rye High Garnet & Black! (I could only find links for the latter to the 2011-2012 issues.)

Let me know what you think!


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Welcome Dr. Jeanice Swift! Here is Some Advice

Dear Dr. Jeanice Swift,

Welcome to Ann Arbor! As I mentioned in an earlier post, I hope that you will sit down with Steve Norton of Michigan Parents for Schools, and John Austin, of the State Board of Education, to learn about Michigan politics around education, and what the legislature has done and is planning on doing.

But other people have some other advice for your orientation. Here it is (and I will also send it to you when I know your email address...)

I am a. . .	Dear Jeanice Swift,
Parent, Community Member	Don't read AnnArbor.com comments, they don't represent the community or its opinions. It's like a car wreck that you can't look away from. That goes for anyone moving to our community, but especially for a public figure like a superintendent - the comments will be nasty and stupid and hurtful and occupy space in your head that they don't merit.
Parent	From the students they are her main stakeholders
Teacher	From a teacher's perspective, I want to know that you know what it means to be a teacher in AAPS. I'd love for you to come to some buildings and drop-in to classrooms (unannounced). You'd get an authentic sense of what's happening in schools and classrooms. While you are going to be very, very busy, taking the time to be visible, personable, and present is going to have a big impact on this community. Our perception of you plays an important role. I also think that it's critical that you understand where AAPS and The State of Michigan are at financially. With Proposal A and the continued cuts to per-pupil spending, I hope that you will join in the political battle as other Michigan superintendents have. If Ann Arbor intends to pass any more millages (which we will need to do to even maintain some of the funding we already have), the community and public must fully understand why we (as a former hold-harmless district) need their financial support. The for profits have moved in (billboards for k12.com are everywhere in Michigan now) and AAPS needs to inform the public as to why we are still a great district and how much better we could be if properly funded.
Parent	Talk to teachers and parents, but not just the ones that are angry about things and come pounding down your door. Go talk to the parents that are running different activities for kids, like Science Olympiad or other PTO things. Just because we aren't screaming mad about something doesn't mean we don't have ideas or suggestions.
Parent	Avoid the polite "welcome reception" circuit, and instead devote time to: 1- attend 3 back-to-school (or "curriculum") nights (one elem, one middle, one high school)--not to be a speaker, but to hang out in the cafeteria or commons & hear what parents have to say about the school. 2 - select 3 different schools (one elementary, one middle, one high) and spend a half-day with the principal, including morning arrival and lunch. 3-attend 2+ after-school or evening games/events at the other high schools & middle schools, talking with parents and kidsJust hear what people are saying.
Parent	Go to the schools and talk with teachers, parents, and staff to get their thoughts on what is going right and what is not going so well in the school. Not everyone will agree but there is often consensus on the big issues.
Parent	I know Ruth already said this, but I want to second the recommendation that you speak to Steve Norton. He is an AMAZING parent advocate with a fantastic lobbying presence and website -- Michigan Parents for Schools. I encourage you to get to know the character of all the individual schools in the district. It would be great if we parents had some way to tell you what we love, and what we don't love or wish for, in our schools. You would learn so much from this! Maybe it could be done with a straight-forward form like this one. And we welcome you in your visits to all the buildings. You will get a good feeling for the schools when you visit each of them.
Parent	Welcome! To learn about Ann Arbor and AAPS, I recommend: 1) Be present in the community and in the schools 2) Sit down with Steve Norton and John Austin 3) Sit down with Ruth 4) Have some sort of mechanism for community involvement. Ann Arbor is full of talented people, yet we have trouble matching the talent with the need in the schools. 5) Enjoy - Ann Arbor is a great city. We have great students and incredible teachers! 6) talk to the teachers
Parent	I'd advise her to read through annarbor.com and Ann Arbor News coverage of local education issues (BOE elections and meetings, community budget forums, the millage votes, etc.) for the past 5 years (at least). It would be great if someone would volunteer to pull a comprehensive set of articles for her so that she doesn't have to use her time searching for them and figuring out which ones she can skip as insufficiently significant. I do think she should skim the annarbor.com comments, but take them with a grain of salt - i.e., I don't think they are usually representative of the community at large, but they do provide a good sense of what part of the community thinks. And there are at least a few commenters who express thoughtful views from across the ideological spectrum in a polite way.
Parent	Visiting the schools, talking to the principals, teachers and parents. Getting input from all members of the Community.
Parent	Visit the schools and tour the classrooms - seethe special education teachers in process; witness the Autism classrooms flowing with structure and compassion, meet the families that rely on transportation and free education; stroll the halls of all the middle schools to get a feel of the diversity of needs within each school; schedule meet and greets with parents (as a special ed mama with an autistic son in the AAPS preschool, and speaking on behalf of many other parents - we LOVE to meet with administrators and chat, just to cycle information both ways. Currently our principal Michelle Pogliano has not held up her agreement to meet with us regularly and it has hit morale HARD within the parent sector. Please visit our schools and meet your parents!).
Parent, Community Member, parent of kids in special ed	Please visit lots of classrooms to see classes in action -- including regular classrooms of all ages, but also special ed, the preschool, Pioneer's theater program -- really seek out a variety of what's unusual to get a clear idea of the variety of what's out there, and what's working and what's not. Also, please talk to lots of people, especially teachers and principals, to find out from them what they need, what's working, and what's not. Thanks for reading this comment. I love that you started with an interview with annarbor.com and hope that you will continue to foster a culture of openness.
Parent, Community Member, Maria E. Huffman	I would advise her to meet people face to face. Maria Huffman
Parent	Welcome to Ann Arbor. As a parent, I recommend that the new superintendent take two kinds of tours of the district. First, she should try to walk through every building and jot down her impressions. I advise that she visit the elementary schools and then the middle and then the high schools to compare just the facilities at each level. Second, she should try to "virtually" enroll. Again, taking the perspective of an elementary parent, then a middle school parent and finally a high school parent. Enrollment options are numerous - especially if you don't want to only use the neighborhood school. Best of luck Marcia
Parent, Community Member	How about community meetings - visiting local school PTOs or holding a couple of "town hall" type events where she can hear directly from parents and teachers? Obviously Dr. Swift will need a few good history lessons from those who are knowledgeable about education politics and legislation, as well as information from trusted sources within AAPS...but the best way to establish a real relationship with the community is to MEET with the community. She could present her vision for AAPS, establish her priorities, and get direct feedback from her real "customers".
Parent	Attend a different PTO meeting every month to learn about what issues different schools are facing. Hold a meet & greet at the downtown library; run it like a comprehensive planning visioning session where stakeholders can come and talk about their priorities, and where those priorities get synthesized into some actionable items.

Blueberries and Kids

I will post about the superintendent search after both candidates have come for their final visits.

From Wikimedia Commons

In the meantime, I saw this piece--(I have read this story before)--and decided I would share it.

I may have been influenced by the fact that I just tasted the first blueberries from my yard. Without being judgmental... they may have been a little bit too tart.


In a Washington Post blog, "The Answer Sheet," Valerie Strauss recaps
Why Schools Aren't Businesses: The Blueberry Story.

Larry Cuban’s 2004 book “The Blackboard and the Bottom Line: Why Schools Can’t be Businesses,” is nearly a decade old but still highly relevant to the education reform debate.
In the introduction, Cuban introduces readers to Jamie Vollmer, a former ice cream company executive who became an education advocate and author of the book ” Schools Cannot Do It Alone.” He quotes Vollmer about “an epiphany” he had in the 1980s:

“If I ran my business the way you people operate your schools, I wouldn’t be in business very long! I stood before an auditorium filled with outraged teachers who were becoming angrier by the minute. My speech had entirely consumed their precious 90 minutes of inservice. Their initial icy glares had turned to restless agitation. You could cut the hostility with a knife. I represented a group of business people dedicated to improving public schools. I was an executive at an ice cream company that had become famous in the middle 1980s when People magazine chose our blueberry as the “Best Ice Cream in America.” I was convinced of two things. First, public schools needed to change; they were archaic selecting and sorting mechanisms designed for the industrial age and out of step with the needs of our emerging “knowledge society.” Second, educators were a major part of the problem: they resisted change, hunkered down in their feathered nests, protected by tenure, and shielded by a bureaucratic monopoly. They needed to look to business. We knew how to produce quality. Zero defects! TQM! Continuous improvement! In retrospect, the speech was perfectly balanced — equal parts ignorance and arrogance. As soon as I finished, a woman’s hand shot up. She appeared polite, pleasant. She was, in fact, a razor-edged, veteran, high school English teacher who had been waiting to unload. She began quietly, “We are told, sir, that you manage a company that makes good ice cream.” I smugly replied, “Best ice cream in America, Ma’am.” “How nice,” she said. “Is it rich and smooth?” “Sixteen percent butterfat,” I crowed.
 “Premium ingredients?” she inquired. “Super-premium! Nothing but triple A.” I was on a roll. I never saw the next line coming. “Mr. Vollmer,” she said, leaning forward with a wicked eyebrow raised to the sky, “when you are standing on your receiving dock and you see an inferior shipment of blueberries arrive, what do you do?” In the silence of that room, I could hear the trap snap…. I was dead meat, but I wasn’t going to lie. “I send them back.” She jumped to her feet. “That’s right!” she barked, “and we can never send back our blueberries. We take them big, small, rich, poor, gifted, exceptional, abused, frightened, confident, homeless, rude, and brilliant. We take them with ADHD, junior rheumatoid arthritis, and English as their second language. We take them all! Every one! And that, Mr. Vollmer, is why it’s not a business. It’s school!”

Read the rest here.

How Cool Is This?/My Head Is Going to Explode

How Cool Is This?

From the BBC News:

So it's here. School Report News Day 2013 is upon us - and about 1,000 schools are due to take part, making the news that matters to them.
They will appear across BBC News - on TV, radio and online and on regional news programmes.
The project is now in its seventh year, and is bigger than ever. School reporters are in Canterbury to witness the enthronement of the new Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby, and we also return to the Olympic Park in London to examine the legacy from the 2012 games. And there's more - the BBC School Report website has full details of the range of topics being covered.
It is all a far cry from when we began. A small team started School Report with the aim of giving teenagers the opportunity to make the news they thought mattered. Giving them hours of BBC airtime was nerve-wracking, but it proved to be a success.

Wouldn't it be great to have something like this across the nation in the US?

My Head Is Going to Explode

And then on the other hand there is this, from a Michigan Parents for Schools facebook post: 

Just wanted to call everyone's attention to something new: Rep. Lisa Lyons, who gave us the EAA bill, recently introduced a bill which would exempt real estate property from the State Education Property Tax. That would remove something like $1.8 BILLION from the School Aid Fund. (It would mean that no one, homeowner or business, would pay the 6 mill SET on their real property.)
What, exactly, is the agenda here? We need to make this known. The bill has been assigned to the Tax Policy committee, and we'll be watching closely. [Ed. Note: This is HB 4452]

 Yup. My head might explode. Who thinks of these things, and why? Do they hate kids?

Are You Following the NWEA MAP Controversy In Seattle?

Over in Seattle, ALL of the teachers at Garfield High School have agreed to boycott the NWEA MAP test. They have the backing of the PTSA, and it appears most of the parents and students are backing them up. A couple of other Seattle schools have joined them.

You can follow what is going on there in a few ways:

Facebook: Solidarity With Garfield High School Testing Boycott

A web site devoted to the controversy:  scrapthemap.wordpress.com

Apparently the district administration is trying to implement the testing schedule, but not very successfully. Most students are not going along with it. According to this Diane Ravitch post,

Wednesday, Feb. 6^th, 2013 is the National Day of Action to support Garfield High School and the other MAP test boycotters who are facing possible 10 Day Suspensions without pay for refusing to force students to take an unfair, counterproductive and bad standardized test.

[Editor's Note: That's today! Links from Diane Ravitch are below.]

Information about the Day of Action can be found here: http://scrapthemap.wordpress. com/2013/02/02/national-day- of-action-to-support-seattle- map-test-boycott/
Share the Facebook Day of Action page here by going here: https://www.facebook.com/ events/366568146775772/
Sign the Support the Seattle Teachers Petition here:
https://www.change.org/petitions/seattle-public-schools-support-seattle-teachers-refusing-to-administer-the-map
Call, email, and write to Seattle Public Schools Superintendent José L. Banda to let him know that you support the boycott:

Superintendent José L. Banda  superintendent@seattleschools.org

 Meanwhile, I was very taken by this photo, posted on Facebook:

I got that photo from the Facebook group called Change the Stakes, which reported:

Here's what happened at Garfield today: Admins came into classrooms and tried to pull students out to take the MAP test in the library. Students stared straight ahead, and wouldn't budge.

In a library with about 60 computers stations set up for the MAP, there were single digit numbers of students sitting at computers. Of those, many sat at the computers and refused to press even a single button.

Meanwhile, I will remind you that you can help change the stakes here as well.
1. Sign the Ann Arbor STOP petition: Stop Overtesting Our Children!
2. Join our Facebook group, Ann Arbor STOP.

 

Your School Should Have One Too

You School Should Have One What Too?
One Town Hall Meeting.

Tonight Ann Arbor Open gathered for a Town Hall meeting, organized by the Ann Arbor Open Coordinating Council (our PTO). It was really positive. That is good because I think in the coming year we'll have lots of bad news.

The Town Hall meeting was called: 30th Anniversary of Ann Arbor Open! Where have we been and where are we going?

The meeting officially began with someone giving the history of Ann Arbor Open. The history of Ann Arbor Open is a little different because it is the history of a program and not a school, but every school has an interesting history.

[Side note: In fact, just the other day Ed Vielmetti posted a fascinating piece about the building of Ann Arbor High School (now Pioneer High School), with a film and everything! Find it here.]

Then we moved into small groups (assigned by colored dots on our name tags) and were asked to discuss these six questions and report out. There was a good mix of parents, teachers, and even a few kids (two of whom reported out for their group!).

I think these questions could be used, with only slight modification, by most of the district's schools.

1. What can parents do specifically to support teachers with increasing class sizes?
2. What can parents do specifically to support specials teachers, staff and administration?
3. How can we lessen the impact of testing on the project-based learning in our school?
4. What methods of promotion (PR) do we use to educate prospective families and the general community about Open Education? How do we provide a common message?
5. What do we do well at our school that we can promote to the greater Ann Arbor community? Multi-cultural fair? The incredible projects that happen in classrooms every day? Others?
6. What does it mean for a family to be part of the Open School?

Anyway--although students were invited--I couldn't interest my son in coming with me.
On my way out the door, though, he asked, "Are other schools doing this too?"
"I don't know," I said.

But now that I've been to one?

I hope so.

Why This Student's Making A Movie About Testing

My college friend posted this link on Facebook, with a note that "This is why I left teaching." (She works as an attorney now, but was a third grade teacher for many years.)

The piece in the Washington Post, entitled "One teen’s standardized testing horror story (and where it will lead)" starts out this way:

Ankur Singh is a freshman at the University of Missouri-Columbia who is making a documentary film about how standardized testing has impacted young people. Here’s Ankur’s personal testing story and an explanation of what the movie is all about. Ankur published this here with the headline, “Who am I and why should you care about this silly documentary?” It sounds like anything but silly.

 By Ankur Singh
Hello, my name is Ankur Singh and I’m 18 years old and just began my freshman year at the University of Missouri-Columbia majoring in journalism. I’m making a documentary film to capture the stories of students and how standardized testing has impacted them. If you’re reading this hopefully you’ll come to understand who I am and what I’m trying to accomplish as well as how you can help me.
This film isn’t a school project or an assignment I was given by some production company, but a personal project that I am pursuing independently.

After telling "his" story about tesitng, he continues:

I’m looking for stories to tell. If you’re a parent or a teacher or a student who knows someone who has suffered from testing as I have please contact me. I want to film a few students go about their day and capture how testing has affected them. How does it affect their love of learning? How does it affect their self-esteem? What if what they’re truly passionate about isn’t measured by a standardized test? This is the story I want to tell, and every student has one worth telling.

Email: listenthefilm@gmail.com
Read the full story here.

So, the election is over. Testing is still here. Arne Duncan is one part of the problem. He is not, by any means, the only part of the problem but there is a campaign to contact him and the White House that is being started. The focus of Stop the Race to the Top is to call the president weekly at 202-456-1111 on your state's designated day with this message: Strive toward giving ALL students access to the same type of schooling your girls enjoy! Abandon Race to the Top & stop privatizing public schools!
Read more here. 

And now that the election is over, our focus turns back to too much testing in Ann Arbor. Whether you are a parent, teacher, taxpayer or student, you should feel free to sign our petition protesting over-testing in the Ann Arbor public schools. Find the petition here. And please--share it with your friends!

Laws About Teaching, Laws About Schools

Here's the latest information from Michigan Parents for Schools regarding proposed Michigan legislation.

We’ve just released the latest version of our legislative update on the “school choice” package of bills which have been making their way through the Senate.The update document is in PDF format, and we will be updating it regularly as the bills make their way through the Legislature. The download link is at the end of the article. The document is current as of 10/15, reflecting the bills as reported from committee or as passed by the Senate.

Here is the link to the PDF.

Keep checking back at mipfs.org for more information.

Good Teacher, Bad Teacher, Red Teacher, Blue Teacher

I've become fascinated by the discussions around "bad teachers." Over and over, I read articles where teachers get their backs up when people talk about bad teachers, and insist that the problem isn't bad teachers (because, they say, there are so few bad teachers), but the problem (for underachieving students) is actually poverty, uninvolved parents, not enough funding, etcetera.

Well, they're right, and they're wrong. Of course the reasons for underachieving students include poverty, uninvolved parents, not enough funding, dilapidated but it's also some other things, namely:

1) Bad teaching (and note, that's only partly "bad teachers," because even teachers who are generally good sometimes do bad teaching) and
2) Poor use of evaluation to improve teaching performance.

That's true, at least in part, because involved (and educated) parents with access to their own money can combat bad teaching--if the parent doesn't know the material, they can hire someone who does...

When my oldest son was in the lower elementary grades, a parent with several older kids said to a group of parents, including me, "Well, you'll have good years and bad," and I thought, "WHAT?! That's not going to happen to my family." Well, she was right. We've had good years, and bad years. Sometimes it was due to the circumstances in my family, but sometimes it was due to bad teaching. 

I've experienced my share of bad teaching, and so have my kids. For the sake of this argument, I'm going to ignore the bad teaching that we've experienced when teachers have themselves been dealing with serious health issues in their own lives or the lives of their family. After all, teachers have their own lives--and if a parent is dying and they are distracted, it is going to affect their classroom performance even if they are usually at the top of their game. So even though I'm ignoring this issue (for right now, and only sort of) I want to point out that it is one of the most common reasons for bad teaching, and that there's lots of educational research suggesting that if students experience bad teaching more than one year in a row, their performance really suffers.

The other piece of the puzzle is whether, or how, evaluation happens. I know that I've had jobs where I did most of the work well, but there were areas where I had room for improvement. I think that is true for most of us. I've also had jobs that didn't suit me at all.

A continuous feedback loop would allow teachers to learn from their mistakes--which is exactly what we expect students to do. In my opinion, most principals have not been taught how to effectively evaluate staff, and if you ask me, schools would do very well to get feedback from parents and students. I am quite sure that my kids can tell you exactly what their teachers have been doing well, and not so well--and very thoughtfully, too.

So here, as a thought experiment, I am going to present some examples of bad teaching. All of these examples have been experienced by myself or by people close to me. I'm interested in which of these you think are irredeemably bad, and which of these would point to a teacher that would need more coaching. Genders and subjects may have been changed to protect the unknowing.

In no particular order...

1. A teacher who has very deep knowledge of her subject (middle school math) but little control of her classroom.

2. A teacher who has moderate knowledge of her subject (high school math) and is very kind to the students, but who has little capacity to share and teach advanced math concepts.

3. A teacher who has moderate knowledge of her subject (high school science) and is therefore afraid to deviate at all from her teaching plan in order to answer questions.

4. A teacher who is extremely knowledgeable about her subject (elementary music) and has very innovative teaching techniques, but who has anger management problems with the end result that students learn music very well and remember it for years, but are unwilling to continue in the subject.

5.  A teacher who has limited skills in his subject area (English) but a wonderful relationship with the middle/high school students he teaches and is really able to provide a "safe space" for them.

6. A teacher who has limited skills in his subject area (English) and writes so poorly it is unclear how he got certification, but who encourages discussion of literature and makes class enjoyable.

7. A teacher with strong skills in his subject area (English) but who is so boring that students fight to stay awake in the class, and who "kills the joy" in the subject.

8. A teacher (elementary) who is very strong at teaching reading, math, and history, but who knows very little about science and therefore doesn't teach it at all.

9. A teacher (elementary) who has interesting ideas and curriculum plans but is disorganized and often doesn't follow through to make sure students do the work they are assigned--and therefore, many students don't do the work.

10. A writing teacher who accepts regular assignments but doesn't provide feedback or request rewrites, even on materials that were submitted as drafts.

11. A middle school teacher who never rejects an assignment that was poorly done.

12. A high school social studies teacher who is an expert in his subject matter and an entertaining lecturer but who belittles and picks on some students, playing favorites with others. 

13. A high school chemistry teacher who is competent in his subject but calls some of the girls "princess" and "helps" those girls on tests.

14. An elementary art teacher who develops interesting activities and then stifles all creativity by requiring students to replicate them exactly the way she set up the example.

15. An elementary teacher who goes to have lunch with two children on a field trip, leaving the other 28 with a single teacher's aide who is technically assigned to one of the class's students.

16. A teacher who effectively teaches social studies, but doesn't respond to emails and phone calls from parents.

The world is a complex place. People are complex. All of these teachers are doing some bad teaching. Which of these teachers needs evaluation and coaching to work on specific problems? Which of these teachers need to find another career?

(Feel free to respond with comments specific to some of these examples. And I'm curious--what percent of teachers in your average school do you think is doing bad teaching, or is a bad teacher?)