I appreciated Commissioner Sue Gendron’s announcement that the Department of Education was willing to modify Chapter 127, but I also believe that the state of Maine menaced public education when it asserted several years ago that Learning Results were intended to be prescriptive rather than descriptive. That which teachers first welcomed as a set of guiding principles and educational ideals had somehow metamorphosed into the operative and absolute standard in every public classroom.

Gendron’s modifications will only temporarily restrain particular aspects of that menace, leaving the main body of it intact and, therefore still capable of inflicting great harm on teachers, students, and public education in general. Consider: The state, which clearly does not trust us to develop, teach and evaluate curricula demands that we develop and repeatedly administer and evaluate a set of common assessments.

The more time teachers and students spend doing these state-endorsed, teacher-developed common assessments, the less time there is for teaching and learning American literature, world history, science, mathematics, and so on. In the end, teaching is drudgery, and learning is drained of individual and social relevance: the mind on fire and the thirst for knowledge become dead metaphors.

I see two fundamental problems with Chapter 127 and the Local Assessment System. The first is implied in the language used by Learning Results advocates: standards, consistency, “all students,” “all kids,” common assessments, accountability requirements, “comprehensive standards-based systems,” collection of “data for certification purposes.”

This is the language with which a state bureaucracy expresses its deep distrust of local control. Such language implies that we do not already have high standards for our students, and that setting and maintaining the same high standards for all students is a realistic objective. I do not know a single public school teacher who believes that all students can achieve the same high standards.

Consider a figure of speech popular with these advocates. They claim that if we set the bar high – say, six feet – in time everyone will be able to clear it. This is an absurd claim, and it is no truer in the classroom than it is on the infield of the track. And, even if we lower the bar, which is what we were advised to do by our school district’s educational consultant, talented athletes will disdain it, average athletes will step over it, and others will balk or in some other way manage to fail.

As teachers, we know from experience that all children are different, and in our public schools we teach all children, the most and the least capable, and so we must be free to adjust our curricula accordingly. Here – in meeting the student, not the standard – lies the craft of teaching.

The second problem was suggested by Patrick Phillips, Deputy Commissioner of Education, who asserts his belief that “individual teacher syllabi and exams are not valid and reliable.”

His assumption that individual teachers are operating in the classroom with complete autonomy and are accountable to no one is a false assumption. As teachers, we are accountable to our students, their parents, our colleagues and departments, our principals, and our school boards. We are also accountable to the employers, colleges, and military services that hire, accept, and induct our students following graduation.

With all due respect to Gov. Baldacci, Commissioner Gendron, and the public at large, if you feel the need to distrust someone in education, do not distrust your local teacher; distrust, instead, the government bureaucracy. The teacher knows your student, knows what each one needs. The Department of Education does not know and it never will, for it is too far removed from the day-to-day reality of classroom sweat and struggle and success. Trust the teacher, not the state official or the hired consultant.

Support LD 426, place a moratorium on the implementation of Learning Results and end educational statism before this creeping menace does any further harm to a public system that has always served this nation well.

William J. Murphy, of Belfast, is a teacher at SAD 34.