I agree with what you say. What bothers me about the Gates Foundation is their education agenda. Their priorities reflect a naive reductionist worldview akin to Rudyard Kiplings' Just So Stories.

MEASUREMENT

I'm confounded by the emphasis on Taylorism (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_management) and privatization, and by extension the emphasis on teacher performance.

Make a list of all things wrong with public education in the USA (inequity, parental involvement, malnutrition, etc). Teacher performance isn't even in the top ten.

A friend works on some sort of in school room surveillance system at the Gates Foundation. It records the teacher. Which is then reviewed and the teacher graded. By what criteria, I can't imagine. Then the teacher's performance is graded and coaching in administered. For improvement. I asked if any teachers were advising the project. No. I asked who reviews the tapes. Non teachers.

Yea, that'll help.

Even more standardized testing is another aspect of Taylorism. As every QA/Test person knows, you cannot test your way to quality.

The only measure of teacher performance is student achievement. But with so many factors beyond the control any teacher or group of teachers, it's patently unfair to judge teachers. And yet ask any faculty, group of students, or parents, and they'll tell you who the great teachers are.

PRIVATIZATION

The outsourcing of education is just a way to divert money meant for the classroom towards cronies. Standardized testing, textbooks, misc contracts are some examples.

The rationalization for corporate charter schools is that somehow the free market will make schools more competitive. Alas, free market means monopoly, not more parental choice.

Further, how is a private entity more accountable than government? I can attend board meetings, vote on levies, submit public records requests. But corporations can easily hide their activities, that's what makes them private entities.

THE FIX

I believe what's needed is more transparency, more accountability, more democracy.

Every single profession struggles with their bad apples. What's needed is a way to hold individuals accountable and some means of either correcting the problem or firing them. This applies to cops, doctors, accountants, teachers, everyone.

It's always an open secret who the bad teachers are. But just try to fire one.

A second friend was a principle for a few years. Of the bad apples, one of his teachers was assaulting his students. For years. My friend wasted three years trying to fire this person. Opposed by the district, the union, the other teachers, etc. Couldn't get it done. Violent teacher was a few years away from retirement, hey buddy, don't rock the boat.

Another friend works in the local school district. He recently related that people within the district admin were quite pleased they only "had to fire" 5 teachers out of 2,000+ in the last year. That's astonishing. I know there's more than 5 bad apples in the district. The documentary The Rubber Room shows what happens to bad teachers in NYC that can't be fired. (Spoiler: They all sit in a room every work day, doing nothing.) I have it on good authority that happens in every district. Probably in every profession.

One example from my experience: I wasn't allowed to fire 4 developers on my team. Pushed onto my team by my VP, who was building an empire. Completely toxic individuals (eg one Lebanese and one Isreali who would go at each other). No other manager would deal with them. Complete drain on my team's morale and productivity. I had numbers, facts, personal reviews in my arsenal. I couldn't fire them. I can't imagine how much harder it is in a public context.

But in truth, I don't know a specific fix is for culling bad apples. I believe this governance issue is the central management challenge in our society.

Meanwhile, I advocate for gathering more data (transparency) so that we can at least know what's going on.

(Thanks for reading this far.)