Teachers know best May the city look upon the recent changes in the Chicago Public Schools as a challenge to rise up to meet the call to true excellence in education for our students. A good first step would be for Mayor Daley to convene a forum to get input from Chicago teachers whose classes consistently achieve growth in reading. In many failing and struggling schools, the voices of these teachers have been summarily ignored throughout the recent years of the well-choreographed dance of the media and their beloved media darlings at the school system's central office. Behind the scones, however, real teachers, in real classrooms, with real students have been fighting dual battles for excellence: the obvious, expected battle against illiteracy, and the less obvious but more brutal battle against the ''powers that be'' who would rather deal with docile, malleable teachers who conform to one mediocre, ''fad'' reading program after another than to acknowledge the fact that well-educated, critically thinking, progressive teachers who have the ability to create plans of action that far more effectively meet their students' needs are what real achievement requires. Large-scale studies of the last century reported that it is the teacher--not the program--that has the single greatest impact on student achievement in reading. Yet, the last six years' focus has been on programs. And the greatest beneficiaries have been publishing companies and school probation management groups--not students. In my school, the promotional programs that preceded quick descent into academic probation included a chess program that purported to increase reading achievement and the controversial ''direct instruction'' reading program, which leaves students with deep comprehension deficits as they move to higher grade levels. It was only through the hard work of highly skilled teachers at my school--not fancy, prepackaged programs--that we were able to undo some of the damage in order to get off of probation in one year's time. As one who proudly teaches in the Chicago Public Schools by choice, I appeal to the mayor to impress upon our new school leaders the importance of taking the millennial step needed to get us where we need to be in terms of serving our students' best interests. These new school leaders must look at new ways of establishing educational environments that empower our teachers and students to reach their highest potential. Until this happens, the untapped greatness of our children will continue to stagnate. Bonita Robinson, Oak Park -- This is the CPS Science Teacher List. To unsubscribe, send a message to <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> For more information: <http://home.sprintmail.com/~mikelach/subscribe.html>. To search the archives: <http://www.mail-archive.com/science%40lists.csi.cps.k12.il.us/>
