Perhaps it's just a straw in the wind. Possibly it was even a mistake, a misstatement awaiting retraction. There's ample reason to describe NEA president Reg Weaver as a follower, not a leader, a perpetuator of the status quo rather than an innovator. But maybe, just maybe, the January 2005 issue of NEA Today signals a partial turn-around by the nation's largest teacher union with respect to standards-based reform in general and NCLB in particular. (You can find it here.)
Here is the key quote:
The persistent achievement gaps between white kids and kids of color; between special education students and their regular-ed buddies; between kids who eat free pizza at school and their classmates who dine frequently in fancy restaurants, are hardly new to educators. But the so-called No Child Left Behind law - with its rules that grade and penalize schools based on the test scores of each group of students - has injected new life into the public discussion of the academic divide. While that discussion is rife with criticism of the overemphasis on testing, the question of how to fix the essential problem of the "gap" remains.
What does this mean for educators, who now are charged almost single-handedly with making the problem go away? It means that it's time to ratchet up the work. The problem may be formidable and NCLB may in many ways be flawed, notes NEA President Reg Weaver, but NEA members must redouble their efforts to help struggling students beat the odds. "It's time to change the focus from defining the problem to doing something about it," says Weaver.
Could it be that the National Education Association is declaring a unilateral truce in its war on NCLB and, instead of pushing for that law's emasculation, is now exhorting its members to roll up their sleeves and apply themselves to solving the "learning gap" problem at NCLB's heart? So one might infer from this statement in the union's main publication.
What could have come over them? It would be nice to think that Weaver and his colleagues have seen the light: that too many kids are not learning enough, that some teachers are complicit in these woeful achievement gaps, and that standards-based reform is a promising solution to this huge problem. Many educators, we know, have figured this out and "gotten with the program." They deserve honor and gratitude, help and reward.
In the NEA's case, however, the likelier explanation is a careful reading of the political handwriting on the schoolhouse wall as signaled both by the 2004 election returns and by the union's reported inability to persuade a single state to join as plaintiff in its long-sought lawsuit against NCLB. Say what you will about the motives of union leaders, they're not that stupid. They can see that it does them and their members little good to commence the Bush administration's second term in the NCLB doghouse - especially with so determined an NCLB booster as Margaret Spellings in the Education Secretary's office. (A different interpretation: conceivably Weaver & Co. viewed Bush's decision to end the tenure of Rod "The NEA is a terrorist organization" Paige as a proffered olive branch requiring a suitable response.)
Still, one reads the fine print and sees that the NEA tiger hasn't turned into an education-reform kitten. They still rue the "overemphasis on testing." They still demand smaller classes and more money. The achievement gaps that concern them are "not just . . . between kids of color and whites, but between girls and boys; between gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgendered kids and their 'straight' peers." (I found myself wondering what's the data source for academic achievement among transgendered youngsters.)
We also need to remember that actions speak loudest and that, so far, all that's audible from the NEA is words. What will count, besides the "signals" thereby conveyed to members, journalists and politicians, is the stance of NEA lobbyists in dozens of state capitals when it's time to legislate, regulate, or appropriate, and in thousands of local school districts when it's time to negotiate the next contract or weigh exceptions to the last one. NEA Today, for example, offers a (tepid) word of support for "incentives to lure experienced teachers to needy schools." Does that mean the California Teachers Association will get behind Governor Schwarzenegger's differential-pay proposals?
In a solid profile of Denver teacher union leader Brad Jupp that appeared on January 16 in the New York Times "Education Life" supplement, Reg Weaver made clear that the job of union officials is to carry out the wishes of the members, not lead them into new territory. "Education reform is in the eye of the beholder," Weaver explained to author Douglas McGray, who summed up the NEA chieftain's "platform" as "more education financing, higher salaries, better teacher training, smaller classes, and no vouchers."
Same old, same old. And no surprise there. What will be more surprising is if Weaver and colleagues turn out to be ready to make their peace with NCLB and standards-based reform. I'm not counting on it. Yet I'm also recalling Emerson's comment when informed that New England transcendentalist Margaret Fuller had declared, "I accept the universe." "By God," quoth the sage of Concord, "she'd better."
"Working with the enemy," by Douglas McGray, New York Times, January 16, 2005
