Michelle Rhee quits in D.C., educational facilities everywhere lose

Instead of face off with a new mayor who likely will not support her ideas about education reform, Chancellor of D.C. Public Schools has chosen to resign. According to the Boston Globe, Michelle Rhee’s resignation was a “mutual” decision made by herself and newly elected Mayor Vincent Gray. Rhee’s term can be served until at least the end of the current school year by Deputy Chancellor Henderson, suggests the Washington Post.

Teachers’ union questioned by Rhee

Test scores within the public schools of the District of Columbia tend to be fairly low. Rhee arrived and changed all that. Rhee fought to make educational facilities better by forcing under-performing teachers to either shape up or ship out. The teacher firings in Washington D.C. begun to go up fairly high. This made Rhee an enemy to most teachers’ unions and those who got fired. According to Innovative Education Management, the system had enabled teachers who had been at a school for 3 years or more to become a fixture at that school. It took a lot of proof for under-performing teachers to actually get fired. Lots of the teachers did not worry about putting forth effort within the classroom. This was because there was way too much job security for them.

It seems that ‘Unions can smell blood’

Now that Michelle Rhee has resigned, it will be up to Kaya Henderson to push her previous boss’s education reform agenda. The Globe describes though, “the unions can smell blood.” All of the teaching talent within the D.C. public schools will likely go away easily when Tenure programs continue and Henderson should be “gone by Christmas” as well.

Many of the D.C. educational facilities started to get donations from foundations due to Michelle Rhee’s passion there. This will probably all change quite soon. Many wonder who is going to take over since Rhee was the only one numerous believed could change anything which means maybe D.C. schools aren’t recovering anymore? We might not see an education reform for some time still. This is because the D.C. teachers union is supported by Mayor Gray. The forecast appears to call for more business as usual for D.C. Schools. The American public schools lost someone else who could have helped. She had been a great reformer.

Data from

Boston Glove

boston.com/community/blogs/rock_the_schoolhouse/2010/10/_she_will_be_replaced.html

Innovative Education Management, Inc

ieminc.org/