CFT_Convention_2011

Please add/revise comments as you see fit.

Dennis Ashendorf: > On the second page, slide 8, of scans below of UTLA's work, is the two main approaches of dealing with Value Added Analysis (VAA) or Value Added Testing (VAT) in a contract. Discussion on the validity and reliability of VAA wasn't discussed. Let me add that, similar to the CST's, scores in the bottom 20% and in the top 20% are not particularly reliable. To put it differently, someone in the top 20% has a 20% chance of being in the bottom 20% the next years and vice-versa. Actually dismissing someone solely due to low VAA scores is twisted. Of course, this is still an improvement over dismissing someone over one year of knowing a CST "cut" score. > **Jim Araby,** a CST organizer analyst we know**,** appears very capable; along with several of the people attending. This is a difficult area. Our stress must be on **retirement security for all**. While my attitude is to compromise on pensions ... it hasn't worked! > The UTLA has been attacked on so many fronts. We are very lucky that we don't have as many problems. There efforts on school governance with pilot schools, not charters, should be recognized for delivering superior education that still hasn't been "validated" by scores. > This was a juicy session on the UC system's efforts to minimize efforts TO TEACH frosh and sophomores by making them take online classes to be moderated by grad students. These courses would also be offered to community colleges and high schools. CSU and CC's criticized the plan because of the low quality of UC instruction! Evidently, 50-60% of American students simply would prefer an A and no work (what a surprise), but UC Berkeley, with 25% foreign (mainly Shanghai) is getting complaints about how little is learned. Furthermore, allegedly, of the 120 members of the faculty senate, none are on the salary schedule. Every single one has a private deal with the administration. This encourages collusion for prestige (high salaries) and less teaching. > It was clear that most college teachers that are online are in an LMS environment (eg Blackboard, Angel, Moodle) and not using canned courses. They are under pressure for higher enrollments, but their contracts are very explicit on this topic. They even own rights to their courses! > Everyone should volunteer for election committee **once**. It takes all Friday night and much of Saturday night. Someone has to do it! > IMHO we're attending too many acknowledgement lunches/breakfasts. Rust is OK, but if I'm not active in EC/K12, it seemed strange to be in the awards banquet. > The speech on Wisconsin was very good. We need to know the order of events. It seem Wisconsin was organized similarly to Costa Mesa. The evil plans were pushed through quickly in CM, but delayed by 24 hour hearings in Wisconsin. Very bad things are happening. **It was great to raise $1,000 for the Pham family.** >
 * ** VAT and Contracts Workshop **
 * [|110318_UTLA_on_VAT_1of4.png]
 * [|110318_UTLA_on_VAT_2of4.png]
 * [|110318_UTLA_on_VAT_3of4.png]
 * [|110318_UTLA_on_VAT_4of4.jpg]
 * ** Retirement Discussion **
 * ** UTLA Alternatives **
 * ** Online Classes (College) **
 * ** Elections Committee **
 * ** General Meetings **