Rhee's attitude stalls reform

As you may have heard, District of Columbia Public Schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee is out to make it easier to fire teachers who are ineffective. It's not currently impossible, but it involves putting the offending teacher on a cumbersome "90-day plan" with numerous loop holes. Having an effective teacher is the single best indicator of a child's success in school. The chancellor wants D.C. teachers to sign a new contract that rewards effective teachers with drastically higher salaries and makes it easier to fire ineffective teachers. Sounds simple, right?

Wrong. Contract negotiations have stalled, and the chancellor has turned to "Plan B," a series of unpopular and possibly unworkable ways around the collective bargaining agreement. If Rhee's extremely generous contract doesn't make it, it will be a major blow for reform efforts everywhere. Many blame the contract's failure on the Washington Teachers Union and its parent organization, the American Federation of Teachers.

But the union can't even hold its own meeting without its various factions creating chaos. The chancellor has unprecedented political will and power behind her. She should have walked away with this contract-it's a good deal for good teachers and it makes the drastic changes the district needs possible. Contract negotiations have failed (so far) in part because the chancellor did two things wrong: She kept her evaluation system behind closed doors and she propagated the belief that she was out to fire veterans of the system regardless of their effectiveness.

There are smart, good teachers working hard inside the DCPS system. So why haven't more of them risen up to defy the union and rally behind the generous new contract? Because not one teacher in DCPS knows for sure whether Rhee thinks they're "bad" or "good." It's completely unfair (and borderline insulting) to ask teachers to sign on to a contract based on an evaluation system they haven't seen. Not everyone shares the policy community's blind faith that Rhee will come up with a fair evaluation system (nor should they).

The chancellor also failed miserably at selling her plan to teachers and diffusing the mistrust that teachers in the system have after decades of "superintendent shuffle" and failed reforms. Last year, the chancellor created a package of incentives for older teachers to retire early. The message was "go now, before I kick you out." It wasn't targeted at bad teachers. It was targeted at veteran teachers. As a result, they weren't sure about the new contract. That's a communication failure, but it's also a failure of leadership.

Relentless drive and unshakeable confidence are among the qualities that make Rhee a powerful reformer. But the climate of combativeness and appearance of disdain that come with it are damaging the negotiation process and risking the success of the new contract, which would be a critical step forward for system. The chancellor is right that teachers should be accountable for student success. So too should she be accountable for effective leadership at this pivotal moment.

Catherine Cullen, Trinity '06, is a former D.C. Public Schools teacher. The full version of this letter can be found on backpages.chronicleblogs.com.