Your average spectator trying to make sense of the breakneck pace of change in the D.C. Public School System might be justified in suffering whiplash.
Here’s the roster of major developments:
» The city devoted $2.3 billion to fix schools and build new ones.
» Mayor Adrian Fenty took control of the public schools and hired Michelle Rhee to become superintendent. A Newsweek columnist called her “brilliant,” and the magazine is preparing a cover story about her reform efforts.
» Rhee has closed 23 schools, fired nearly 100 central office staff, sacked a bunch of principals.
» In her latest move, Rhee has jolted the Washington Teachers’ Union with a two-pronged proposal that allows teachers to choose between two tracks in the new contract; both are generous but also wipe out seniority preferences, and one institutes merit pay.
If there is a central spine that runs through all the changes and creates the dogma of the new day in D.C. schools, it is a sharp focus on the classroom, teachers and students. Listen to Rhee’s many speeches and pronouncements, and you will hear her dismiss any extraneous matters that would stop her reformers from getting great teachers who will improve test scores.
Keep this in mind: Great teachers; improved test scores.
Which brings me to the curious case of Art Siebens.
Siebens has taught biology and other science courses at Wilson Senior High for decades. My daughter took his AP bio class last year. They didn’t get along. Siebens accused my sweet daughter of insubordination and called me in for a meeting. Hardly shocked, I negotiated a detente.
To call Siebens quirky is an understatement. Do you know any other teacher who hauls out his guitar on “back to school” night and has parents sing “It’s a Water Water World,” his song about H20, to the tune of “If I Had a Hammer?” Siebens has recorded a collection that teaches science through song. His students sing and learn — even my unruly daughter.
By any statistical measure, Siebens is a success. His students consistently score well on the AP bio test. His Wilson classes are filled with high-performing students headed for top colleges, but minorities learn and score high as well. Numbers do not lie.
So, Art Siebens is by all accounts a great teacher, and his students score well on tests. So why was he fired? Neither Rhee nor Wilson’s new principal, Pete Cahall, has offered a complete explanation to Siebens’ fans, including 560 who have signed a petition to bring him back.
“Dr. Siebens was one of those rare teachers at Wilson who really, truly cared about his students,” wrote Devorah Flax-Davidson, 2005 valedictorian now at Michigan. She was “horrified and incensed” that Siebens got the gate.
Siebens isn’t talking — or singing. His supporters are appealing to Fenty and Rhee, but neither will make a move. Clearing up the Siebens debacle falls squarely in the lap of Pete Cahall.
It’s a no-brainer — bring him back, to suit Rhee’s dogma: great teachers and high test scores.
E-mail Harry Jaffe at [email protected]
