If you’re wondering how New York state came to pass a teacher evaluation system that will put all teachers on a bell curve, evaluate them based upon test scores, and have the ones who are ranked on the bottom of the bell curve fired as “ineffective,” look no further than Bill Gates’ own company, reports the Perdido Street School blog. Citing a report in Vanity Fair, the blog notes that a Microsoft-based management system known as “stack ranking” effectively crippled Microsoft’s ability to innovate. “Every current and former Microsoft employee I interviewed—every one—cited stack ranking as the most destructive process inside of Microsoft, something that drove out untold numbers of employees,” investigative reporter Kurt Eichenwald writes. “‘If you were on a team of 10 people, you walked in the first day knowing that, no matter how good everyone was, two people were going to get a great review, seven were going to get mediocre reviews, and one was going to get a terrible review,’ says a former software developer. ‘It leads to employees focusing on competing with each other rather than competing with other companies.’” Starting next year, this vaunted Microsoft employee evaluation system comes to New York State public education. Every year, two out of every ten teachers will be rated “highly effective,” three will be rated “effective,” three will be rated “developing,” and two will be rated “ineffective.” Those rated “ineffective” for two years in a row will be fired…
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