It’s a fun party question to ask, “If you could meet anybody, who would it be?” Me, I love people and couldn’t really narrow my list down at all. Truthfully, I find so many folks interesting – especially the weird ones (who gravitate towards me like a magnet, I might add… no names mentioned). But usually people mean the question in terms of which famous person from history [dead] would you like to meet?

Still, I have a list a mile long. But probably at the top, I’d have love to have met some of the biggie writers. I’m talkin’ canonical Mo Fo’s.

- Dostoevsky

- Victor Hugo

- Hemmingway, Thoreau, Franklin, and Billy Boy Shakespeare!

Could you imagine sipping tea with Poe?

How about going for a row boat ride with Emerson?

A late night cafe con leche with Cervantes?

Me, I think the writers would be fascinating but then again, I’m a book dork. I mean chatting art with Monet, design with Michelangelo, or love (and ears) with Van Gogh would be hot!

And I am not sure if one could beat a clam bake with Dali or a barbecue with Picasso, either

Let’s not forget music. Perhaps there might not be a more tickling reaction to be had as giving me the chance to put a pair of iPod ear buds on Beethoven’s head so that I could expose him to the artistry of Justin Beiber.

But still, if I had to choose a famous dead person I really have no idea which way I’d go. It’d be a “thinker” though, of that I am pretty sure. The military folks never intrigued me as much as those with a philosophical bent. (Not that military guys aren’t thinkers, but I’ve a luvah, not a fighter.)

Lamb with Aristotle? Yes.

Turkey sandwiches with Stonewall Jackson. Eh, I’d take it, but not even a top 100. And though I am sure he’d eat my liver if he heard me say this, Dr. Seuss intrigues me far, far more than Attila the Hun.

Who would you choose? And why? Me, I have no idea. (But secretly I have always wished I was the one who wrote Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure a movie where two high school kids time-travelled and got to have a great time with all kinds of famous dead folks).

Einstein, Voltaire, Plato, Jesus, Buddha, Mohammed, Moses… it’d be great to share some chips and salsa with any of these cats, too, I think.

I’ve also noticed that my list is notably male. I blame patriarchal history. In a battle of Charles Dickens vs. Jane Austen, I’d take Charles Dickens every time. That’s not to say Jane wouldn’t be a kick in the pants – and only a fool would suggest that sharing a front porch and a glass of lemonade with Emily Dickinson wouldn’t be pretty outstanding – but the guys do seem to dominate my thoughts. Sure Getrude Stein, Sylvia Plath, Mother Goose (actually, she might crack my top 100; I’d just sit there with warm cookies and milk and drool the afternoon away) they all hold an attraction. (And now that I think about it, Jeanne d’ Arc would be a “let’s have some bouillabaisse” pick for sure). But the dudes certainly feel like they are carrying the category for me. (Perhaps there’s an argument for castration to be had in the reason why, somewhere.)

If I could only pick one? No idea. (But W. Somerset Maughm feels like a top 5.)

As I discussed yesterday, when it comes to measuring teacher effectiveness (it’s all the rage in national education policy these days), I, as an educator, want multiple measures to be used.

Yesterday I conceded the use of student test scores via bubble tests to measure my effectiveness because I know that this is a deal breaker for the policy makers in D.C. On this point they are intractable and if politics is the art of compromise, then fine — I’d rather accept multiple measures that include test scores than have no seat at the decision making table and have a host of ridiculous other stuff rammed down my throat.

And ram they will.

So what measures do I want? Yesterday, I said I wanted peer evaluations to count. Today I am going to ask for administrative evaluations.

Yep, I want them. But, the quid pro quo is that I want my administrators to be evaluated by the teaching staff as well. And I want the federal government to use whatever stick they will use to punish me for not meeting their targets to be the same stick they use to admonish admins who do not meet their targets.

Let’s level the playing field. Teacher effectiveness is related to administrative effectiveness so while we are re-inventing the “assess our school professionals wheel” let’s do it properly, huh?

We need to implement an administrative effectiveness tool side-by-side with this new teacher effectiveness tool.

It’s not biting off more than we can chew. It’s called doing it properly one time instead of perpetually re-doing it over and over and over again.

Truly, I repeat, it makes no sense not to do all of this at the same time. (Or else, let me guess, eight years from now some genius is going to look up and say, “Ya know, teacher effectiveness is related to administrative effectiveness. Maybe we should measure them, as well?”)

Suddenly, that cantankerous VP who makes every teacher’s life hell but sucks up to the Assistant Superintendent like a lap dog will not have a place to hide. Conversely, the principal that really goes to bat for their staff yet takes it on the chin from the Assistant Superintendent will have a means of not being forced into the role of subservient lap dog.

Let the admins measure my effectiveness. But theirs must be assessed as well.

And then we get to the juicy stuff… the district level measurements of effectiveness.

Why should they not also have to answer to the assessment and accountability God? I am not joking, either. A great Supe gets a lotta love from the peeps in the district. I know, I have seen it many, many times. And a bad Supe operates almost with impunity nowadays.

Tyrants in a fiefdom, unchecked and protected only by mammoth buy-out clauses.

Look, there are basically three levels to classroom education that are being funded by the state and nation: the classroom level, the administrative level and the district level. (The state level already has to answer in part to the Federal level and the state’s voters — plus, that realm of accountability is only growing these days so I don’t want to tread into that muck too much).

Admins, please feel free to measure my effectiveness. But know that your own effectiveness will be measured by me as well and whatever consequences can be meted out for my underperformance will apply to you as well should your measurements not measure up.

Justice is blind, no one is above the law, and take that, Mo Fo!

Fair is fair.

The VP who comes at 5:30 a.m., leaves at 7:45 p.m. and does the work of three distict level employees… give ‘em some love.

The bonehead principal who only has two more years to retirement and is playing out the string trying just not to cause any waves nor expend too much effort.

Meet your maker!

This game is gettin’ fun now, huh? Suddenly, everyone is accountable and teachers can’t be the only ones demonized with data.

Multiples measures for measuring teacher effectiveness will continue tomorrow… post is growing too long.

The teacher down the hall from me hasn’t been at our school very long. And while I know her name, my high school has well over 150 educators and, some years, more than 4,000 kids on campus. Additionally, our professional turnover rate is exceptionally high and, truth be told, after years and years and years of seeing people come into our English department, and then leave our English department for one reason or another (i.e. the work is too hard, the environment is too challenging, this “inner-city teaching thing” is just not for them, California is just nut-so and they are moving back to a more sensible place, and so on) you just don’t get to know everyone the way you ought to until they have been around a couple of years and made it past the dragon.

What dragon? Let’s be honest, Title 1 schools can be a buzz saw and no matter how much you try to help someone, at some point each of us has to face down the creature that lives in the belly in the public school beast ourselves and determine, “Am I going to continue on here or am I going to move on to another world that makes more personal sense?”

There’s no one on my campus who has not confronted such a monster. Some of us confront it monthly.

So when I saw the teacher down the hall at the CATE conference this past weekend, my eyes lit up.

She was there because she wanted to be there. No Dept. Chair muscled her into a Saturday attendance. No one bullied her into seeking some professional development to improve her classroom craft. No one mandated that she do some extra hours to stay job-eligible. She was at CATE because she paid her own way to attend. Nope, the school district didn’t cover her conference fee (a few hundred bucks) or her transportation or her parking or her lunch. (BTW, how many superintendents ever visit a conference on their own dime? Don’t ya get the sense that if they even had to even pay for their own bottle of water they’d take a pass and say, “Naw, not worth it”? But teachers… another story entirely.)

Just by seeing her at the conference, I feel closer to the teacher down the hall now. I feel as if she has faced the “dragon” and found a way to say, “Bring it on, Mo Fo’, cause I got something for ya, too!”

It really takes that kind of attitude in a way to do what it is we do everyday. And even though I try to be supportive of all the other teachers on campus, I think I am going to make sure I give a little “extra oomph” to helping the teacher down the hall. There are a few personal books from my own professional development library she might want to read, there are a few “mazes around our campus” I might be able to help her better navigate, maybe she just needs someone who has been around here for a while to acknowledge the good work she is doing in a public way, like at our next department meeting. Who knows?

But schools help people who help themselves. It’s a rule that is just as true for teachers as it is for students.

When Peers Face the Dragon and Come Out on the Other Side, you can see it in their eyes.