My level of frustration with RTT applications--and the Department's decisions on finalists--is growing.
A couple days ago, I wrote about Georgia, a RTT finalist, which gave the impression that it was doing big things when in fact new legislation or significant additional activity was required in order to bring about real change.
Illinois--another finalist--has done the same thing. Claiming to be in favor of major shifts in teacher policies, the state instead pushes essential decisions far into the future, making meaningful reform nothing more than hypothetical.
It begins this legerdemain by discussing how strongly it is embracing new teacher evaluations. Since "teacher and principal evaluation in Illinois is broken," the state is committing to using student data to rate educators' effectiveness.
But then it cleverly--brilliantly, deviously--pivots, saying, "Illinois is not prepared to immediately build a framework of statewide policies of such monumental consequence upon a still developing evaluation system."
That enables the state to forgo all of the tough decisions.
It will not develop a performance pay system: "The State??has made the strategic decision not to implement an untested alternative compensation system??statewide."
It will wait until 2012-13 before even considering revising its tenure laws to make use of the new data system.
It will rely on a stakeholder group to propose legislation that would tie poor evaluations to termination decisions.
Illinois has made it to the penultimate phase of the Race to the Top, within a stone's throw of half a billion dollars, with a series of weak promises of potential future activity--reforms that may very well never occur.
This is not the "very, very high bar" we were promised and that this program deserves.
--Andy Smarick