As a college student, my schedule is constantly feeling hectic and irregular between juggling school and work. This feeling of having crazy schedules is something that has become a “norm” in our society. With that being said, during this reading O’Neil discusses how these irregular schedules come from the source itself, the data economy. The data economy consumed by math technology calculates information such as how many customers a company has each day, and uses that information towards building schedules for workers. This essentially saves the company money (which prominently comes out of employee paychecks), by putting their workers together on busier days. This takes away from one, having a regular schedule throughout the week, and two getting paid consistently. O’Neil brings up a great example of a mother going to school, working, and caring for her child all at the same time. As this mother works at Starbucks (one of the biggest companies), she goes through a constantly changing schedule which eventually effects not only going to school, but how she can manage the time to care for her child. With the data forcing inconsistent changes in her schedule, she ended up putting a hold on her education. This is a great example of a negative on-going loop where this mother will now be stuck working a low paying job, instead of further progressing in the workforce. On that same note, Starbucks took into consideration this type of problem, saying they would make changes to their computer systems. They failed to keep up with this type of change, with many workers not having their schedules a week in advanced. This is a prime example of how a big data economy or weapon of math destruction allows for tweaks (which in this case saves the company money) in their system not taking into consideration their employees, and how it may impact their personal life outside of work. As a teacher it is important to be aware, especially when working in a low-income area that this sadly may be the case in many households. With many people striving for work and hours, this becomes a way for companies to control and twist people’s life no questions asked. It’s vital to keep in mind that many parents may not have a choice, and are essentially fending for themselves and their families’ day by day. With that in mind, some children may need to take on the care-giving role for younger siblings in families who are making ends meet each day that cannot afford to miss work. Taking a look back at the Starbucks example, the model they used was made specifically to profit the company throwing the employees to the curb. The model itself is the problem. Companies need to shift their model’s purpose to help eliminate the stress of getting enough hours or pay that comes within the workforce. In addition, O’Neil brings up a strong point regarding action, stating how people need to start going against companies who may do this, and a great way to do that is through media and regulation. Furthermore, O’Neil discusses the issues of the value-added model of teacher assessment. She brings up an example of a teacher (who’d been teaching for 20 plus years) that failed a teacher evaluation also known as the value-added model. The following year, the same teacher achieved a very high score. This showed how this teacher evaluation was an inaccurate formula that could’ve cost him his job when he failed the first time. With this huge neglect of teacher evaluation within the administration, the school decided to make a change within the model and score the teacher based off an already predicted score that the student had to pass. Ironically, the administration made the model increasingly unfair, blaming the teacher on the students passing or non passing scores. This randomized testing excluded necessary factors such as having a diverse classroom and the inclusion of special education. The value-added modeling system, is something that will not go away anytime soon unless parents decide to opt-out of their child participating in this type of testing that puts a strain on the jobs of teachers everyday.
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