"As part of comprehensive school reform, we are being forced to participate in a process that is part of the sanctions associated with failure to make AYP. For the past two years, we have had people 'train' us in business models (Baldridge) that are supposed to improve kids' test scores.

"Our students have been referred to as 'products.' Our 'trainers' (are we dogs?) have been longtime school teachers who are retired and now working for the Baldridge offshoot, Jim Shipley and Associates. Not one of our trainers has taught at the senior high school level (let alone at an alternative senior high school). One trainer is a Middle School Teacher; one is a Kindergarten Teacher; one person is not even a college graduate. (I'm not making this up.)

"Not only this, but these folks write reports that assess how cooperative and compliant the staff was during the trainings. I got into a vat of very hot water because I had the audacity to point out that some of the things they were presenting to us simply would not work with our population. My comment was reported to the Shipley headquarters, our district superintendent's office, and my principal's office. Both he (the principal) and I were called on the carpet for failing to take full advantage of the training. (He was reprimanded for failing to make his staff understand that they must see the merit in every part of the training, and I, for speaking out.)

"We continue to be held hostage by a process that will not abate until we make AYP, which is not likely to ever happen considering that our student population is made up of kids who've got miserable academic track records in traditional high school settings.

"Our students were given the SBA (standards based assessment) in March 2006. It is now the end of October, and we still have not received the results of this mandated exam. We know the results have been generated because we have been told that we failed to make AYP.

"Since the beginning of the school year, we have asked to see the results of the exams. Our principal received an e -document that was lengthy, complicated, and difficult to follow; he said he was waiting until a more sensible document was sent to him.

"So, if you had a doctor perform a battery of high-stakes tests on you, would you wait more than six months for the results? What good would the results be six months after the fact? I would be curious to know whether I am the only teacher who:

• "resents that these tests are paid for by my school district rather than the federal government,
• "resents that the scores for my school exist somewhere, but I do not have access to them,
• "does not understand why it takes so long for the tests to be scored, and the results sent back to us,
• "resents that I must conform to a timeline created arbitrarily without my input or consent, and
• "resents that the folks who generate these tests do not have to conform to any reasonable timeline in providing the test results. (I suffer sanctions; they do not.)"

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