The lowest quartile

In every school I've worked, I have always encountered the dreaded bottom 25 per-centers. In order to make positive changes in these employees, a good administrator will spend half of his/her professional time trying to make them better teachers. Sound familiar?

We all know them; these teachers work hard at trying to get out of doing what is best for the students and their school. They come to school just before the bell rings. They operate more out of intuition with little planning. They go into their classrooms "cold turkey" with no specific plan in mind. They have little respect for the educational process, their students, colleagues or school. Their students constantly score at the bottom quartile of the state test or any other standardized test.This of course brings down the whole school's ranking. And they will argue with the result, "It was not my fault. I followed the guides", "I lacked materials/supplies", "I didn't get enough support", "They gave me the slowest students"... They blame everyone but themselves.

As a principal, I held annual meetings following the public results of the state tests results. We reviewed strengths and weaknesses and made future plans for strategically addressing ways to improve by grade levels. At this meeting, I also publicly reviewed each individual teachers test results. In descending order, everyone could see all classes and how each class scored. Instead of teachers names, I used a letter to identify each class, them I gave each teacher a sealed envelope with the letter so they could identify their own class. Teachers with the highest scores and all those on the top quartile publicly demonstrated their happiness; most of the teachers who were amongst the top shared the identification of the classroom. They congratulated and hugged each other. To my astonishment, some of those at the lowest 25% would also publicly identify themselves by making comments complaining how hard they worked and how their students had failed them. Unbelievable! Blaming the students for their failure and shortcomings...

These "teachers" truly believe that they are working as hard as they can and should not be expected to do anymore. They have more absences than normal and fail to leave lesson plans for the substitute. They come to school empty handed and leave the same way. They project a poor professional image in dress, personal grooming, classroom environment, community relations. They don't look like teachers and don't behave like teachers, they don't feel they need any assistance and cry harassment when they are monitored too closely.

Does this mean we shun these people, refuse to talk to them, ostracize them? No, but we can never allow ourselves to become accustomed to poor performers. Don't kid yourself, they cause a great deal of harm to your school and our profession. They are in the ranks of your teaching staff. They need to be neutralized and administration needs to terminate them.
Sadly these incompetent employees see themselves as mavericks and there are some teachers who like having them around. They treat them as if they were equally competent but truthfully they put up with them because "they stand up to administration" and in reality having them around takes the pressure off everyone else.

Fortunately we are learning more each day how to deal with the bottom quartile. If we allow these individuals, be it teachers or principals, to bring down our profession, we are all guilty of abandoning our values, and the code of ethics of our profession.

Would you put up with a student like this in your class? Should a principal put up with a teacher like this in her school? Should a superintendent put up with a principal like this? I think NOT!