By Anthony Cody.

This particular teacher appreciation week we seem to be getting an especially hard sell on the virtues of John King, who left behind a state full of angry parents and teachers in New York in order to seize the reins of President Obama’s Department of Education, just as the administration prepares to leave. The big theme we are hearing is that Secretary King wants to “elevate the teaching profession.” This story cites the Teach to Lead program, which is a Dept of Ed partnership with ASCD and the National Board. King says,

The idea is to empower teachers to lead from the classroom. Too often teachers feel that they have to leave the classroom to address policy issues. We wanted to create a pathway for teachers to develop initiatives while staying in the classroom.

In honor of Teacher Appreciation week, King released this statement. Much of it is the sort of praise we often hear from politicians. He also states:

…the Obama administration and I are invested in lifting up and honoring teaching. We understand that teacher voice is a crucial part of conversations that impact your classroom and your profession, and we are committed to ensuring you are supported so you can do your best work on behalf of our children every day. We believe strongly that teachers should have a voice in the policy decisions that affect you and your students.

This may not sound very new. King’s predecessor, Arne Duncan, also used his office to try to “elevate” teachers. In 2012 Duncan launched “Project RESPECT,” as described here. But for some reason teacher morale continued to plummet in spite of this. And we never seem to get policies that show evidence of real input from teachers.

At this point, in the eleventh hour of the Obama administration, I am not especially interested in trying to get teachers a “seat at the table,” since far too often this seems to be a symbolic gesture devoid of real meaning. Programs like “Teach to Lead” tend to confine teacher leadership to things like “help colleagues to implement the Common Core.” Support is rarely offered to leadership that actually challenges existing policies. For that sort of leadership, teachers need to get a bit outside the government and philanthropy-funded boxes, and work within their unions, or with groups like the Network for Public Education, or the BadAss Teachers.

We should be clear on what WOULD elevate the teaching profession, and push for it. I want to see changes in policies that would be obvious to anyone who spent a week or two in a school. I posted this question on my Facebook wall last night: If you were made Secretary of Education for a day, what are three things you would do to truly “elevate the teaching profession”? The suggestions that follow are a mix of my ideas and those of dozens of friends who responded.

Free teachers from evaluations based on test scores and bogus VAM calculations. The majority of states brought this nightmare to life in direct response to Dept of Ed coercion – the one-two punch of Race to the Top grants and NCLB waivers. John King should make it clear that the Department of Ed. no longer supports the pseudoscience of VAM, and supports states and districts who abandon these methods. (See detailed recommendations regarding teacher evaluation here.)

Cease federal support for charter schools, which have the effect of drawing resources and students away from democratically controlled public schools. The Department of Education has actively promoted and funded charter schools, in spite of research showing that they increase segregation and deprive public schools of funding. Encourage and direct support to community-controlled local schools.

Support and strengthen due process for teachers. Support the expansion of union representation as this is one of the most important ways to protect individual teachers and the profession as a whole. Far too often teachers do not even have the ability to speak out on many issues affecting their work and students because of fear that they will lose their jobs, or have poor evaluations as a result. Strong due process protection is a prerequisite for teachers to be truly empowered.

Decertify “virtual” schools, which divert public school dollars into for-profit online schools that are virtually worthless.

Cut off Department of Education funding for Teach For America. The Dept. of Ed decided that TFA was for some reason worthy of numerous grants, including $16 million in 2015, on top of $50 million the organization received in 2010. Incredibly, in spite of this heavy taxpayer support – and many millions of additional dollars from corporate philanthropies – TFA still charges impoverished school districts hefty “service fees” to place their temporary teacher trainees in classrooms. A Department of Education that wishes to “elevate the teaching profession” cannot support as some sort of “innovation” a program that places teachers in charge of classrooms after five weeks of training.

Adopt policies to reverse the dramatic decline among teachers of color, African Americans in particular, in schools across the country. Sending in TFA short-termers, even if diverse, will not help, especially when they displace career teachers of color, as we saw in New Orleans. We need to investigate to see how changes in evaluation and hiring practices have affected teachers of color, because this decline has coincided with federally inspired “reforms” in these areas.

Support the expansion of Ethnic Studies programs, which have been shown to dramatically improve achievement for students of color, and provide much needed understanding for white students as well.

Provide support for financially strapped districts to reverse the decline in the number of librarians, counselors, nurses and other support staff that are so important for children. These colleagues are part of a functional school environment. When they are removed, teachers are left with far too much on their plates, and students suffer as well.

Remove any Federal consequences for standardized tests. The most powerful message teachers send every chance they get is that high stakes testing is corrupting our work, forcing teachers to focus on test prep. If you want to elevate the profession, allow teachers’ work to return to a focus on children, not test scores.

Actively support school initiatives in art, music, dance, drama and athletics. Children are complete beings, and schools should embrace their capacity for creativity and self expression.

Protect student privacy, and stop promoting the collection of student data for use by ed-tech companies. Using computers to “personalize learning” has yet to show any real advantages. Our government should be protecting students from companies seeking to profit from their data, not promoting the practice.

Promote genuine “personalized learning” by supporting reductions in class size, rather than spending huge amounts of money on unproven tech devices.

Work to address unequal funding of schools. It is insane that, as a society, we often provide the students with the greatest challenges schools that are the most poorly funded. Funding should be equalized, with additional resources allocated for schools that support students living in poverty, with disabilities and English learners.

Many of these suggestions extend beyond a narrow conception of the teaching profession, but all have a big impact on our work as teachers. We have been making similar requests of the Obama administration since the fall of 2009. I do not have much hope left in my “hope and change” reservoir for this administration, but as the summer approaches, and new candidates are once again seeking teacher votes, it is time to make our demands clear once again. We marched on Washington at the Save Our Schools march in the summer of 2011, and it looks as if it is time to march again. I hope you will join me in DC this July 8 to let everyone know what it will truly take to elevate teachers and students.

What do you think? If you were Secretary of Education for a day, what would YOU do to elevate the teaching profession?