The mid-semester removal of seven teachers has left remaining instructional personnel shuffling to fill the slots at Alachua Elementary School and Rawlings Elementary School.
The teacher removals were not a district-level decision, according to Alachua County Public Schools (ACPS) spokeswoman Jackie Johnson.
Both Alachua and Rawlings are School Improvement (SI) schools, which both earned D grades in the state’s latest school accountability report.
Teachers are graded on Florida’s Value-Added Models (VAM), which are meant to evaluate how much learning growth a teacher can be credited for, regardless of the student’s starting point. FLDOE then limits how many teachers rated “Needs Improvement” or “Unsatisfactory” can work at an SI school.
Johnson said FLDOE has an online tool which districts can use to see their teachers’ VAM scores, which are normally available at the end of July.
“That’s the tool that we use, because that’s what the state tells us to use,” Johnson said.
That was the tool ACPS had used when filling out its state-required SI school checklists for Rawlings and Alachua, which were sent in by Aug. 19.
A month later, as part of FLDOE’s regular check-ups on SI schools, Rawlings had a visit, with representatives from the school, district and state.
At that meeting, Johnson said FLDOE told district administrators that there were updated VAM numbers, and when ACPS reviewed them, the new numbers were different from what was available at the end of July.
The new numbers required the removal of three teachers from Rawlings, and four from Alachua. Johnson said those teachers have not been removed from the district, only transferred to teach at other schools.
Rawlings Elementary has replaced its three underperforming teachers with one certified teacher from outside the district and two ACPS-certified teachers on specialized assignments (TSAs) at the district level, according to Johnson. She said ACPS expects to be able to put one of those teachers back on special assignment after adding another certified teacher from outside the district in December.
Alachua Elementary’s removals included a media specialist, who has been replaced by a long-term substitute who was previously working at Loften Professional Academic Magnet High School.
The other three teaching roles are being filled by two TSAs from the district level and one instructional coach who will move into a teaching role.
Marianna Padgett, the mother of twins who attend Alachua Elementary School, introduced herself to the School Board of Alachua County (SBAC) at the board’s Oct. 15 meeting. She said she had received a note from the school that day, telling her that her daughters’ teacher was being moved.
Padgett said all of Alachua’s fifth senior teachers were being moved, and that school staff said they would be replaced by long-term substitutes. She said the short notice was bad for teachers, students and parents.
“My girls came home highly upset about this,” Padgett told the board. “I’m highly upset about this as a parent. I feel like parents weren’t given a time to rally and back these teachers.”
Johnson said ACPS’s decisions are “very data driven” and the district and FLDOE both provide a lot of support to struggling schools like Alachua and Rawlings. She said ACPS is not the only Florida school district that has had to adjust to updated VAM scores mid-semester this year.
“The timing is certainly not ideal, but when that updated VAM data came out, we did not have any choice,” Johnson said.
VAM scores just like the standardized test scores are flawed and should not be used for anything.
Underperforming Teachers not fired but moved to spread underperforming to other undisclosed schools. Wow , I mean are you kidding me?
You’re taking the VAM score as a valid measure of teaching ability. Sorry, but it’s flawed. VAM includes an expectation as to what a student will score on the state assessment and then whether the student made that score. Big red flag- A media specialist received a low VAM score? What student scores was she assigned as her responsibility, 3rd, 4th, 5th? Which class or all of them? Shes going to change student test scores by the books they check out? And then, it’s “better” to replace her with a substitute?
At some point in the process, common sense needs to have a greater impact on the decisions. The State missed the window for reasonable changes to occur. You provide more support to the Teachers who need it. You assign some additional teacher aides or take some downtown certified experts and assign them to help in the classroom for a half-day. You don’t make the children readjust at this point. It upsets them and affects everything in that class and school.
Incredible, you need some real leaders, if any are left.
What was the job of those TSA,s that are now not able to do their broader job, and are back in the classroom? Also, They apparently took one of the teaching coaches, (either math or reading?)who WAS the support to improve teacher ability, and put them in a classroom instead. Hey, if coaches and TSA’s aren’t needed, why did we hire them?
The coaches are not needed.
As a teacher with 100% excellent reviews and evaluations for 25 years in the state of Florida, I’ve seen so many excellent teachers leave the profession or the state. I retired early, because the games the state plays with teachers and schools are so demoralizing and have nothing to do with good education. Politicians know very little about education and what makes it good or poor. It’s all political.
If I understand the protocol, improvement is not measured from the starting point. This does not make sense and causes students with the most difficulties to have the most disruptive class with a teacher being replaced. Who made this process and what can be done to make it more fair?
Vote.
too bad administration’s impact isn’t tested for accountability
Or the parent.
Ultimately, the problem also lies in the fact that student’s scores do not particularly affect them. If you get all 1s, you still can matriculate in many grades. The amount of students who just choose random answers to get the test over with is concerningly high. The system doesn’t make as much logical sense as it seems; this is judging a mechanic by how many accidents people get into after they leave their shop. Was it a bad tire? Did a person just run a red light? Both equally effect the mechanic’s rating as skilled or not.
The removal of the TSA’s SCHOOL WIDE (new/vet teacher, administration, and most importantly STUDENT) instructional support and impact in MULTIPLE fragile and non fragile schools to appease 1 classroom of 20 to 40 students is mind boggling! Some TSAs have completed a year long extensive FLDOE state training in Tallahassee and have received a FLDOE certification specifically on how to support and Coach up the Instructional capacity of school leaders and teachers and teacher support staff… With the support from TSAs, schools like Metcalfe Elementary increased 2 school grades, as well as with TSA school impact Lake Forest, Idyllwild, increased as well. Struggling teachers will continue to struggle without certified Coaching support… Metcalfe data has already begun to decline in state student performance, the certified Literacy TSA who supported that school 2 years in a row has been reassigned to a classroom due to the removal of teachers with unsatisfactory VAM scores at other schools.. Although the state COACHING certified TSAs can impact those few students that they have been abruptly assigned in that classroom, what is to happen to the schools, teachers, and students the TSAs were in the middle of supporting and working with??? Teaching takes planning and it takes preparation and a mental mindset, to go from one role to another, even in the same field takes time for the best results… Now, TSAs are at risk of low VAM scores coming in to an environment in which they had no initial impact on the first wave of assessments, student learning, behaviors, etc that will now go under their professional certification and name.Not to mention WHO is going to support all the low VAM scored teachers in their new classes? It’s not fair to those students or families nor teachers nor TSAs…
Concerned Retired Administrator & Grandmother of ACPS students
Yes, so true.