Transcript of Randi on Charlie Rose

Here is a transcript (posted at: www.tilsonfunds.com/Personal/Weingartentranscript.pdf) I had made of Charlie Rose's interview with Randi Weingarten last week.  Below are some excerpts, including this knee-slapper about how powerless teachers are (coming from the most powerful interest group in the country!): 

 

Randi Weingarten:      Let me just say one more thing.  Why is it in the United States of America that one of the only industries that have such union density is teachers.  The reason that teachers still have such union density, are so well organized is because they are powerless.

 

                                    Everything is thrown at them and ultimately what they do is they ask for unionization.

 

Charlie Rose:              Why are they powerless?

 

Randi Weingarten:      Because what happens is that we have the fad of the month, we have the reform of the year and what happens is all they want to do is they want to teach kids.

 

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Excerpts from Charlie Rose interview with Randi Weingarten

Here are the highlights (some knee-slappers here, such as how powerless teachers are):

 

1) On the bill banning using test data in tenure decisions:

Charlie Rose:              Here’s what he [Bloomberg] said about teachers’ unions, which you represent.  Here it is, [Plays Audio] ‘The teachers’ unions – part of the problem or the solution?’ 

 

                                    ‘I think it’s a mixed bag.  We have over the last six years raised teachers’ salaries 43 percent.  We’ve instituted merit pay.  We’ve gotten rid of a lot of the seniority rules.  The teachers are teaching longer and they’re doing a better job. 

 

                                    On the other hand, the teachers’ union last week convinced the legislature in the dead of night to insert in the middle of a budget bill where this had nothing to do with budgets, a law that says in New York State we can’t use teachers’ ability to teach as a measure deciding whether or not to give them tenure. 

 

                                    It’s just unconscionable that this was pushed through our Albany legislature.  So in that case they couldn’t have been more on the wrong side.  Generally however, we have had good relations and they have been a positive force for change.’

 

                                    So there you go.  Let’s talk about the teachers’ and tests.  It’s at the core of every conversation you ever have –

 

Randi Weingarten:      Correct.

 

Charlie Rose:              -- about teachers.  How do you measure their ability in terms of how much you pay them, in terms of tenure, in terms of merit pay – tests?

 

Randi Weingarten:      First off, one of the things I would just – look, I understand that the Mayor is angry –

 

Charlie Rose:              About this thing.

 

Randi Weingarten:      About this thing because they did something that they ought not to have done.  This issue had been resolved a year ago in April.  Having said that –

 

Charlie Rose:              Who’s they?

 

Randi Weingarten:      Who is they?

 

Charlie Rose:              Yeah.

 

Randi Weingarten:      The Mayor and the Chancellor.  Governor Spitzer resolved this issue last April about how we – because last April, truth be told, we actually all together made the tenure process, which is simply a due – after three years -- teachers have probation for three years – after three years tenure means they can’t get fired without having due process.  That’s all it means.

 

                                    But let me go directly to this question, which is how do you evaluate teachers.  Ultimately where the Mayor is really wrong and virtually every educator would say that to him is that standardized tests were never intended as a measure of good teachers, good teaching or how teachers teach.

 

                                    Every expert in the country including the Mayor’s own experts will tell you this.  In fact, even their experts will say that if it’s used it should be used as a little factor.

 

                                    But there’s a bunch of things, Charlie, and this is where we agree; not disagree.  There’s a bunch of things that you can use and should use in order to make sure that we’re getting great teachers and keeping great teachers and evaluating teachers in terms of how they teach.

 

Charlie Rose:              Okay.  I didn’t invite you here to compare you with the Mayor, but you work in this system and the Mayor is in charge of this system and the Chancellor is his chief executive officer as Chancellor to do something about the system and I want to explore philosophies.

 

                                    But you’re saying that all educators you know and all that advise the Mayor don’t believe that standardized tests are a way to test, as used as a measurement for teachers?

 

Randi Weingarten:      There is no one who thinks right now that you can use standardized tests in this state to isolate the effectiveness of an individual teacher. 

 

                                    That’s why frankly everyone else in the state, including the school boards, the state school boards, is hailing the compromise that the Governor and the legislature came up with this year because they frontally attacked this issue and said let’s see. 

 

                                    Let’s give it a real independent look to see if you can use – these are call value added – see if you can use these value added metrics to actually evaluate teachers.

 

                                    They’re going to form a study commission not in the back room of Tweed, but something very transparent that the legislature and the Governor does. 

 

                                    So let’s look at it.  Let’s see if it actually works.  But right now there’s not an economist or an educator, even people we fight with, even if you ask the Chancellor can you actually right now using current metrics, can you isolate the effectiveness of an individual teacher.  Their answer would be no.

2) On getting rid of incompetent teachers:

Charlie Rose:              Should teachers be fired if they’re not doing a good job?

 

Randi Weingarten:      Teachers – I believe that teachers who are not cutting it should have a due process procedure –

 

Charlie Rose:              Let’s assume due process, but should they be fired if they’re not doing a good job?

 

Randi Weingarten:      I do not think the school system should have to have incompetent teachers; absolutely right.  And ultimately what we’ve done in terms of this, Charlie, is last year, in terms of 2006, we actually did something called a peer intervention plus process. 

 

                                    The unions itself offered to police our own profession because fair and reasonable and objective kind of evaluation measurements, it’s really important to get to a place where everybody agrees to what those measurements are and how to do it.

 

                                    But we’ve been able to do it in this city and we’ve been able to do it in other places around the nation as well.  One of the things that we try to do and all of us very proudly did this in 2006, we said let’s have a peer review process so that if a supervisor says a person isn’t cutting it, even if the person has tenure, then what we’re going to do is bring somebody independent in to see and then –

 

Charlie Rose:              But who would that independent person be? 

 

Randi Weingarten:      We’ve agreed to it.  It’s being implemented in the city school system right now.  And then that person actually goes and testifies at the due process hearing.  So ultimately there is no one that – teachers themselves don’t want to be teaching side-by-side with somebody incompetent.

3) On the DOE's ability to fire teachers:

Randi Weingarten:      It’s frankly a lot of this, in terms of evaluation, the city school system has huge power right now to fire virtually anybody in the first three years of service and so a lot of –

 

Charlie Rose:              Before they get tenure.

 

Randi Weingarten:      The difference between the first three years of service and after tenure is that you have a hearing.  That’s really the only difference.  But they have a lot of power and ultimately what happens is –

 

Charlie Rose:              They have a lot of power meaning the school system.

 

Randi Weingarten:      The school system could fire somebody like this in the first three years of service.  So when the Mayor says that he wants to tie tenure or the acquisition of tenure to test scores that have never been used for this purpose, I’m saying to myself what happened to the principal’s institute, what happened to evaluations and things like that. 

4) You shouldn't criticize teachers unless you've been one:

Randi Weingarten:      The folks who quickly give a bromide about what teachers should do and shouldn’t do and what unions should do and shouldn’t do, I often just simply say to them I want you to teach one period a week, every week, teach with me. 

 

                                    I’d love to go back to teaching.  Clara Barton was one of my favorite teaching jobs ever.  Just go and teach one period a week before you start talking about what teachers do or don’t do or teacher unions do or don’t do.  In New York City teachers work incredibly hard. 

 

                                    Most teachers put in not just what they do in class, but hours and hours and hours a day.  I think the last survey we took teachers work an average of ten hours a day.  I told you the story about my mother –

5) On how powerless teachers are (I kid you not!):

Randi Weingarten:      Either way is going to require more teacher contact time.  When you are a high school teacher, for example, frankly a high school teacher has 150 kids a day or 170 children a day.  And every high school teacher I know and every elementary and middle school teacher I know goes home with a stack of papers every single day.

 

                                    So this kind of nonsense about we’re not accountable, we’re not – we don’t care about kids, it’s just – it’s so disconcerting to teachers and to their union.

 

                                    Let me just say one more thing.  Why is it in the United States of America that one of the only industries that have such union density is teachers.  The reason that teachers still have such union density, are so well organized is because they are powerless.

 

                                    Everything is thrown at them and ultimately what they do is they ask for unionization.

 

Charlie Rose:              Why are they powerless?

 

Randi Weingarten:      Because what happens is that we have the fad of the month, we have the reform of the year and what happens is all they want to do is they want to teach kids.