Posted by Ed at AFT

On my first day of teaching a regular (i.e., not special education) program, I was in my assistant principal's office making copies.  She asked me what they were for.  I said I wanted to get my kids settled down right away and I wanted to check their reading and writing skills.  She said, "And that is..." and waited for me to finish her sentence.  I said, "going to tell me where their reading and writing skills are."  She replied, "No.  That is an assessment device," as if this was totally different from what I had just said.  It was a long jargon-filled semseter.

I raise this because I'm reading a blog by John Carr, president of the National Air Traffic Controllers Association.  The terminology can make it rough going for an outsider. But it's funny and passionate. And a lot of it resonates with issues confronting K-12 education.  For example, see one controller's comments about the Federation Aviation Agency's efforts to cope with a controller shortage:

People now are taught the most basic phraseology, separation standards, and precedures that will get them through a shift without killing any aircraft.  They don't know why they do a lot of it.  So when something weird goes on, not within the very limited database they know, they won't be able to flow with it and provide service to the pilot in trouble...

All of that is a HUGE shift in corporate thinking about training.  It's not the FAA's objective anymore to train an employee for a career of progressively more complex traffic and responsibility, as our training was structured.  Instead, it's a corporate philosophy that puts butts in the seats with just enough knowledge to keep the conga line moving....They not only don't care if employees know nothing outside their little slice of the job; they prefer it.

This reminds me of the worst aspects of many current reforms, from good programs like TFA to the nonsensical and the ugly.  They encourage turnover in the profession rather than seeking to build a corps of teachers that can afford to stay and will want to do it.  Another post discusses how some controllers suspect that the FAA is undermining their work in order to lay the groundwork for privatization or harsher personnel changes.  I usually roll my eyes when someone talks about NCLB as a similar conspiracy, and I think Carr is right when he points instead to a general failure of leadership--but it makes you wonder.

P.S. If you are a frequent traveler, it's worth looking at NATCA's new web site for tracking airline delays.  The NATCA blog talks about why the controllers are choosing to shine a light on this problem in an effort to improve service.