Looking Past the Spin: Teach for America

[proud2BlibKansan]

By Barbara Miner

Most Teach for America recruits are idealistic and dedicated. But who is behind the organization, and does its approach bolster or hinder urban education reform?

It is late at night, foggy and misty, and road construction has forced me off the interstate into downtown St. Louis. My Google directions are useless and I follow my nose, heading west on city streets to my hotel. I go past abandoned buildings, lonely gas stations, dimly lit rescue missions. I think of stopping to ask directions, but the neighborhood’s desolation gives me pause; it’s hard to find an open business, let alone any people walking about.

I am driving from Milwaukee to St. Louis for an article on Teach for America, to get a first-hand take on what is a media star in urban education reform. As I drive past yet another building with flaking paint and boarded-up windows, my cynicism grows. Do people honestly think that sending Ivy League graduates into the St. Louis schools for two years will somehow unlock the academic achievement that is seen as a cornerstone of rebuilding our cities? Can the antidote to educational inequity, urban disinvestment, and neighborhood decay really be so simple?

As my thoughts wander, I try to regain focus: I am writing a story about Teach for America and education reform, not the abandonment of low-income communities of color. They are two separate issues. Or so I keep reminding myself.

more . . . http://www.rethinkingschools.org/archive/24_03/24_03_TFA.shtml

[FBaggins]

1. "Some critics have dubbed TFA “Teach for Awhile” and “Teach for a Résumé.”

The first makes some sense... the second doesn't.

Teaching for two years in the inner city does not improve a Harvard graduate's resume in any significant regard. Certainly not over what they would otherwise do with those two years.

there’s no doubt that TFA has proved inspirational to many recent graduates and has helped make teaching a noble and respectable undertaking.

This is a valuable achievement. I think it should also be noted that some of these teachers stay in the profession. I have no doubt that the retention rate is lower than the traditional avenues of teacher recruiting, but some of them stay. And these are high-quality graduates who would otherwise have gone into different fields.

would ultimately like to run for office

This is a key aspect of how I see TFA that the author simply doesn't seem to understand. I'm fine with my elected representatives having a Harvard degree... and I like it when they have decades of experience & leadership roles to inform their decision making. But I sure would like it if more of them had spent a little time in a classroom (on the adult side of the desk). My understanding is that TFA takes graduates who are far more likely (than the average education major) to be moving on to policy-making roles.

If that doesn't help a student in a classroom today, it may help thousands twenty years from now.

[Hannah Bell]

6. Since ed reform is high-priority, I think TFA will be very helpful as a resume item for the future

pols who'll push through more privatization & the future CEOs of our corporate education establishment.

I doubt these folks be much help to students generally, however.

[tonysam]

2. TFA dovetails nicely with the World Bank's goal of deskilling education

to the point that anybody with an eighth-grade education will be able to "teach" students. TFA is just one of many means to destroying teaching as a profession.

TFA's are NOT teachers but temps.

[FBaggins]

3. Wouldn't it be a little easier to spin that "8th gade education"...

...if we weren't talking about IVY League graduates?

I understand your bias and the reason for it... but surely you recognize that not EVERY story fits in to the conspiracy to ruin your life?

[timo]

4. funny group

Here along the Texas/Mexican border, they are a funny group to watch...they come in SOOOO DEDICATED AND WITH REAL FIRE IN THEIR EYES, THEY ARE GOING TO MAKE A DIFFERENCE!!!!!! by Christmas holiday they are usually planning an escape route or have developed a drinking problem as a coping mechanism.

[Hannah Bell]

5. TFA founder wendy kopp's husband = head of KIPP & former Edison VP. How interesting.

Marcello Stroud sent me TFA’s 990 for fiscal 2008. It shows that TFA had revenues of $159 million in fiscal year 2008 and expenses of $124.5 million. CEO and founder Wendy Kopp made $265,585, with an additional $17,027 in benefits and deferred compensation. She also made an additional $71,021 in compensation and benefits through the TFA-related organization Teach for All. Seven other TFA staffers are listed as making more than $200,000 in pay and benefits, with another four approaching that amount.

It’s also interesting to look at the 990 for the KIPP Foundation, the charter school chain led by Richard Barth, a former Edison vice president and TFA staffer who also happens to be Kopp’s husband. Barth made more than $300,000 in pay and benefits, bringing the Kopp/Barth household income to almost $600,000 for their work with TFA and KIPP. (In a 2008 article, the New York Times dubbed Kopp and Barth as “a power couple in the world of education, emblematic of a new class of young social entrepreneurs seeking to reshape the United States’ educational landscape.”)



Incestuous locusts, these "reformers".

[Catshrink]

7. I thought TFA was a non-profit.

Still, that's a boatload of money in these times. 4-6% paycut next year but hey, I'm thrilled that I have a job.