Between September 11 and 14, an interesting debate sprung up between visitors to the Paperpusher Message Board about the role of teachers and the teachers' union. It is showcased below...
"Tabby"'s response to Nemo Blank
John Takis is studying English and Education at Michigan State University. He comes from an extensive background in secondary school education. Most of his family has taught at the middle or high school level.
"The education administrators and teachers themselves control the school boards because they fund the campaigns. That's how the Teacher's Union, the corrupt Democratic Party and the building contractors that bribe them have conspired to build the giant schools that have turned the education system into sludge."
HAH HAH HAH HAH HAH HAH HAH!!! :'-) Pardon me, Nemo, but as someone who has spent his entire life examining "the system" up-close, that is the most RIDICULOUS load of bunk I've heard in a long time! I know we're all supposed to play nice and respect each other's opinions, but if you're going to make a blatant attack on teachers/teachers unions like that I'm not going to hold my tongue. HOGWASH!
Teachers are the most hard working labor force this country has! The OVERWHELMING majority come to school early. They leave school late. They throw their lives into the care and training of youth because they LOVE it. And to top it all off, it's one of the most thankless jobs in America!
Sure, there are bad teachers. I've had quite a few myself over the years! But when you compare the percentage of bad teachers to the percentage of, say, bad doctors, or lawyers, or administrators ...
Teachers today have to FIGHT to get contracts that allow them to keep up with inflation, let ALONE ask for MORE money. No, Teachers Unions aren't the problem. The problem is this warped social philosophy of "teacher accountability." I don't mean teacher qualifications -- it's only reasonable that a teacher should be qualified. I mean the teacher being held responsible for the student's performance. Every educator I've talked to, from four generations, knows full well that this philosophy is hideously flawed.
I feel sorry for DeMartino, because when Sandi flunks out of school, they're going to blame HIM! When Kevin can't qualify for that football scholarship, they're going to blame HIM! If Daria kills herself, they're going to blame HIM! I see it every day, and it makes me SICK. The sooner parents realize that teachers are on THEIR side, the sooner things will start to improve. But that will never happen, because American society as a whole is too busy championing freedom and independence to be held RESPONSIBLE for anything.
As for School Boards, 90% of the ones I've encountered are made up of pretentious, power-drunk idiots. They don't know two things about the educational system, despite their rhetoric, and most of them NEVER enter a classroom. I know there are exceptions, but they're few and far between.
Here's the way things work at the schools I see. A bratty kid doesn't do his homework. Gets an F. Complains to Mom that the class is too hard. Mom complains to the School Board. School Board complains to Principal. Principal reprimands teacher. NONE of the "offended" parties ever bothered to TALK to the teacher, or actually VISIT the classroom. By virtue of his own "special truth", the child is naturally right. That's the reality I see.
I see a reality where a student throws a book at a teacher. Fortunately, he misses. She sends him to the principal's office. The principal comes back and chews her out. "It slipped," he says. She protests. The School Board meets, and makes a decision. They make her the Elementary School gym coach to get her out of the way.
I see school boards that hire substitute teachers until the very last day before they have to get full pay, then FIRE them. I see school boards that inform a choir director, on the FIRST DAY OF CLASS, after a SUMMER OF PREPARATION that he's no longer teaching choir ... he's teaching journalism. Bless his heart, that teacher tried his damndest. And when he didn't do a good enough job, they FIRED him. Forty students came to his hearing and implored the board to reconsider. They ignored the students.
I see a violent child who has been caught smoking marijuana, slashing tires, and putting BOMBS in mailboxes RE-ADMITTED, in the face of protests by the teachers, because he was the star quarterback on the football team, and he "deserved another chance." He was caught drunk and disorderly a week later. God, I wanted to puke.
The Teachers Union isn't perfect, but it's very often the only defense educators have against a fantastically unjust system. Educational philosophy today is ass-backwards. The teachers are the victims, not the perpetrators. I'm not saying their aren't corrupt teachers. There are corrupt priests. There are corrupt EVERYTHING. But I'll be damned if I'll sit by while the people I know and love and care about are broad-handedly defamed like this. For shame!
99% of the teachers I know (and I know a LOT of teachers) are SAINTS. They take SO MUCH abuse. They could be much happier and just as poor doing a hundred other things, but they slave and sacrifice for other people's children. And this is the thanks they get -- people see their little corner of the world, they put the teachers where they want and never bother trying to understand. "Too powerful" my ass. This is the reality of the situation. I'm sorry, because there are exceptions, but they ARE exceptions, not to be applied to such blunt and abusive use, and anyone who says differently is flat-out WRONG, whether THEY think so or NOT.
I suppose the elves will delete these posts. So be it. I suppose a Daria messageboard is not the place for this kind of talk, and I haven't been very polite, regardless. So chop away! But while such an ignorant statement does stand posted, I cannot allow it to go unrefuted.
Sorry to jump down Nemo's throat like that, just because his opinion differs from mine ... I'm sure his reaction is a response to the information and situations he's been exposed to. But if you're a police officer who just took a bullet, and you come face to face with someone talking about how law enforcement is responsible for the rise in crime, it's hard to keep quiet.
In his own words: "My... uhm, lady I take to the movies, is a substitute teacher, trying to break into the racket. All of her friends are also educational types that are scratching around, waiting for an opening. They talk about it all the damn time.
"I helped a guy get elected to the school board. He was my boss at the time, so I had to feign interest and listen to his raving."
"The education administrators and teachers themselves control the school boards because they fund the campaigns. That's how the Teacher's Union, the corrupt Democratic Party and the building contractors that bribe them have conspired to build the giant schools that have turned the education system into sludge."
HAH HAH HAH HAH HAH HAH HAH!!! :'-) Pardon me, Nemo, but as someone who has spent his entire life examining "the system" up-close, that is the most RIDICULOUS load of bunk I've heard in a long time! I know we're all supposed to play nice and respect each other's opinions, but if you're going to make a blatant attack on teachers/teachers unions like that I'm not going to hold my tongue. HOGWASH!
Well, that's the way it is around here, John. The local school district administrators are busily campaigning for their choice in school board members, and they are using a distance learning system (illegally) that I maintain to coordinate it across the whole state. The union helps those who want to 'improve' our schools by hosing money on them.
I don't see where you've actually answered my charges. We have the close to the lowest ranked school system in the world and the highest cost per student. The system lacks any sort of accountability, because of the matching funds system. Half of the money is disbursed by some murky state and federal tangle, and with the grant of matching funds goes control over nearly every detail of how a school should be built and run. Who do you suppose those far away bureaucrats listen to? Some little school board guy from Podunk who wants to be able to fire a teacher for not being able to read or Al Gore, when he's begging the NEA for cash and help every four years?
Teachers are the most hard working labor force this country has! The OVERWHELMING majority come to school early. They leave school late. They throw their lives into the care and training of youth because they LOVE it. And to top it all off, it's one of the most thankless jobs in America!
So what? I work hard too. That still has no bearing on what I asserted. I have no problem with teachers as individuals, but I think that the NEA has ruined the schools by taking the power to run them out of the hands of the directly elected representatives of the local voters.
Sure, there are bad teachers. I've had quite a few myself over the years! But when you compare the percentage of bad teachers to the percentage of, say, bad doctors, or lawyers, or administrators ...
When you compare what? Typhoid to syphilis? None of those guys are public employees. A corrupt teacher does more damage in one year than a bad lawyer will do in his life. That has nothing to do with anything I said, though.
They aren't individually corrupt, but any group will fall to it's lowest common denominator. Teachers don't want to have to prove their competence every day like the rest of us have to, so they use their political clout to make sure that they get a free ride.
Teachers today have to FIGHT to get contracts that allow them to keep up with inflation, let ALONE ask for MORE money. No, Teachers Unions aren't the problem. The problem is this warped social philosophy of "teacher accountability." I don't mean teacher qualifications -- it's only reasonable that a teacher should be qualified. I mean the teacher being held responsible for the student's performance. Every educator I've talked to, from four generations, knows full well that this philosophy is hideously flawed.
Bawhahahahahahahaha! I wish my boss would buy that line. 'Gee, sir, the transmitter don't work. Oh well, it's not my fault. I'm going home.' Maybe you're right, though. It isn't the Teachers fault? Then who? As I said before, it's the people who write the checks that buy the services of those teachers. But they aren't allowed to dictate what will be taught, when where and how. That power is diffused up into the land of the NEA controlled bureaucrats. Who pays the dues that allow that corruption and subversion of local democracy? Why?
I feel sorry for DeMartino, because when Sandi flunks out of school, they're going to blame HIM! When Kevin can't qualify for that football scholarship, they're going to blame HIM! If Daria kills herself, they're going to blame HIM! I see it every day, and it makes me SICK. The sooner parents realize that teachers are on THEIR side, the sooner things will start to improve. But that will never happen, because American society as a whole is too busy championing freedom and independence to be held RESPONSIBLE for anything.
My point exactly. No one is responsible for a giant snafu. The school board should be responsible for the school, with no federal and state lackeys of the NEA bogeyman hanging over their shoulders. The money is spent in outrageous amounts and nothing comes out. Where is it going? No one can tell. Oops, what about the millions of administrators? Why are they necessary? After all, we have a school board, a bunch of more or less dedicated teachers and the voters, who all want good schools for their money. Where is the short circuit? Wait... Those administrators are NEA members too! And the businessmen that they support by disbursing public money... do ya suppose there's a connection?
DeMartino should be able to tell Brittany and Kevin to sit on opposite sides of the room, Document their indolence when they don't study and eject them from class when they fail to improve. Most voters would agree. Why can't he? Because no one up at the top of the local heap, with any sort of power to change anything is facing re-election based on the performance of the school, so no one cares about his concerns.
H Ross Perot undertook a study of the Texas schools and came to a lot of unpopular conclusions. Unpopular with the NEA and the football coaches, that is. When he rammed his anti-football pro education agenda through the Texas legislature, it bruised them terribly, but the population was just fine with it. It took the NEA months to change it all back.
As for School Boards, 90% of the ones I've encountered are made up of pretentious, power-drunk idiots. They don't know two things about the educational system, despite their rhetoric, and most of them NEVER enter a classroom. I know there are exceptions, but they're few and far between.
The educational system? What's that? the one that can't keep up with home schooled kids? Those board members have no real power to change anything, because the Supreme Soviet up at the state and federal level really runs the schools. All the locals do is budget the amount that they are allocated. They can't look at a school and say, "Every other kid in this school is illiterate? Let's get the staff in here and find out why, and then FIX the damn place." All they can do is dole out the money that they are allocated, in the approved manner.
Here's the way things work at the schools I see. A bratty kid doesn't do his homework. Gets an F. Complains to Mom that the class is too hard. Mom complains to the School Board. School Board complains to Principal. Principal reprimands teacher. NONE of the "offended" parties ever bothered to TALK to the teacher, or actually VISIT the classroom. By virtue of his own "special truth", the child is naturally right. That's the reality I see.
The reality that I see is that no one is accountable for the school's performance. The teacher gives an F and it irritates the board because the board isn't running for re election on performance, having no influence on the running of the school. They are running on anonymity. They are elected lackeys and like all lackeys, they kowtow to pressure.
I see a reality where a student throws a book at a teacher. Fortunately, he misses. She sends him to the principal's office. The principal comes back and chews her out. "It slipped," he says. She protests. The School Board meets, and makes a decision. They make her the Elementary School gym coach to get her out of the way.
Oh, I agree with that. Teachers have no power in those schools. No one does. Power is excercised far away, in secret, out of sight of the local elected representanives of the local taxpayers. Teachers should be able to get rid of the bad apples. It's not the board that's the problem. It's the corruptionist ideal of American power politics as practiced by the education unions that's stinking the country up. If you have a clearly defined elected leader of a school system, one that actually has the power to set curriculum, to hire and fire, to build, to plan and to make the decisions, then that person is the one with his or her neck on the chopping block when it comes out that Johnny can't read. That person will back the teacher in disciplinary matters, out of self interest. What you have now is a bunch of empty suits who just collect a fat paycheck to sign checks as directed and let the faceless higher ups take the blame.
I see school boards that hire substitute teachers until the very last day before they have to get full pay, then FIRE them. I see school boards that inform a choir director, on the FIRST DAY OF CLASS, after a SUMMER OF PREPARATION that he's no longer teaching choir ... he's teaching journalism. Bless his heart, that teacher tried his damndest. And when he didn't do a good enough job, they FIRED him. Forty students came to his hearing and implored the board to reconsider. They ignored the students.
We all got our troubles. The puppet board obviously had a cash flow problem. They probably stole too much last year. Maybe they didn't want a choir teacher who couldn't cross train to do double duty. If his damnedest wasn't good enough, what can you say? The guy has to keep up. Don't they have lesson plans? I have to go back to school every year, just to stay current. My job changes drastically. My boss would can me in three seconds flat if I couldn't do my job. What the hey. I'm not against Unions fighting against a raw deal on a local level. I'm just against public employee unions subverting democracy and bribing the pol's on a national scale. I don't believe that teachers are bad people, or lazy. I believe that they are public employees, and like all such will try to put a collective hammerlock on the system. I think the rank and file of the teachers get hosed just like the rank and file of every union group always does. The real juice is behind the administrators of these huge school districts that disburse the state and federal school money, but you're all kameraden together, right? When you hear that half of the new hires in a state can't read and write at an sixth grade level, it dries up sympathy though.
I see a violent child who has been caught smoking marijuana, slashing tires, and putting BOMBS in mailboxes RE-ADMITTED, in the face of protests by the teachers, because he was the star quarterback on the football team, and he "deserved another chance." He was caught drunk and disorderly a week later. God, I wanted to puke.
The Teachers Union isn't perfect, but it's very often the only defense educators have against a fantastically unjust system. Educational philosophy today is ass-backwards. The teachers are the victims, not the perpetrators. I'm not saying their aren't corrupt teachers. There are corrupt priests. There are corrupt EVERYTHING. But I'll be damned if I'll sit by while the people I know and love and care about are broad-handedly defamed like this. For shame!
I look at results. You have the NEA, the union that is the major backer of the Democratic party. That party sucks millions in soft money out of the teachers, then sets up a system where they are powerless? You are only powerless to do your jobs. If you didn't care about education you'd all be happy. Maybe you guys ought to take down your national leadership, because as I see it, you are being sold down the same river as the rest of us. Of course with local control of schools, national teachers unions would be impossible to organize. You can't collective bargain with a collective of school boards. So what you do is freeze the system in place by having its local powers subsumed by the state bureaucracies, turning it into a monolithic system that you CAN collectively bargain with. Big schools, big districts and big money. HEY! Them union feller's was smart, back in the fifties when they set it all up.
99% of the teachers I know (and I know a LOT of teachers) are SAINTS. They take SO MUCH abuse. They could be much happier and just as poor doing a hundred other things, but they slave and sacrifice for other people's children. And this is the thanks they get -- people see their little corner of the world, they put the teachers where they want and never bother trying to understand. "Too powerful" my ass. This is the reality of the situation. I'm sorry, because there are exceptions, but they ARE exceptions, not to be applied to such blunt and abusive use, and anyone who says differently is flat-out WRONG, whether THEY think so or NOT.
Get real. It's a job and a pretty dammed good one at that. No radio towers to climb, no physical labor and no boss screaming at you to get it in gear. Three months off. My neighbors are teachers and they seem to have new cars, paved driveways and a dammed nice house so I don't buy that starving teacher thing either. Do me a favor. Look up the federal yearly contribution to each child, then your state's contribution. Add in the local tax bite. Then count up the students in the school, calculate the raw amount, subtract the cost of commercial rent of similar school space in an office building and then divide the remaining money amongst the real working teachers. You'd all be driving Mercedes if they did it like that. So what is the real overhead?
I suppose the elves will delete these posts. So be it. I suppose a Daria messageboard is not the place for this kind of talk, and I haven't been very polite, regardless. So chop away! But while such an ignorant statement does stand posted, I cannot allow it to go unrefuted.
Refuted? I think not. I understand all too well, so ignorance isn't a factor either. The NEA is egregious in it's damage to the country but its not unique. It's just another example of how the game works. The Federal government collects the taxes, then overwhelms local government with it's supposed largesse, perverting the democratic process on behalf of the forces of greed and corruption that understand how to farm politicians. A dollar of contribution gets you a thousand back.
But I don't dislike teachers. They are just working stiffs, concerned with themselves. We are all to blame for being pliant enough to live with such incredible levels of corruption in the country, in every single sector. The legal bribery of federal and state politicians is the root of all evil.
We have the close to the lowest ranked school system in the world...
I'm just going to have to disagree. We have one of the best public school systems in the world, despite its shortcomings. International ranking is vastly overrated. If you're going to be fair, look at EVERY school system, not just the top countries. This whole mess all started when we got so panicky over Japanese test scores. We had to "reform the system" to catch up. We didn't stop to think that the Japanese only test and educate the very top percentile! Now educational philosophy is designed to destroy the bell curve. Everyone's a winner! To accomplish this, I heard one administrator say "The most important thing is for our kids to feel successful." Not BE successful ... FEEL successful. So we lower national standards.
I entirely agree that the bureauocrats are chiefly at fault here. To make everyone equal, to give everyone the "same chance" administrators are cramming conformity down teachers' throats. The system pressures them to lower standards, and to find "creative" ways of passing their students in an environment without discipline. Teachers who don't conform suffer. This is a huge factor in attracting more and more negative teachers. If the trend doesn't stop, we're all in trouble.
I think that the NEA has ruined the schools by taking the power to run them out of the hands of the directly elected representatives of the local voters.
Besides, better the teachers in charge of the school than the students. If you ask me, society has failed the teachers. How can they be held accountable if they can't enforce discipline? If they aren't given the power to resist harmful doctrine?
They aren't individually corrupt, but any group will fall to it's lowest common denominator. Teachers don't want to have to prove their competence every day like the rest of us have to, so they use their political clout to make sure that they get a free ride.
That's an awfully broad generalization. I agree that people who abuse the system should be cracked down upon. The rest should not be made to suffer at their own expense.
Bawhahahahahahahaha! I wish my boss would buy that line. 'Gee, sir, the transmitter don't work. Oh well, it's not my fault. I'm going home.'
The transmitter doesn't have self-determination. Teachers need to be held accountable for making education accessible. If their students won't swallow it, the administration and the parents need to back them up, like they used to. That's the only way education will improve. But now teachers have no support. They are villainized by society, when society (culture, the media) ought to be positively affirming a productive ethic on the part of the student. We advertise apathy. We send kids the message that there's no reason to look at education as something to be strived for. So they don't strive. And it's up to teachers to make them strive? A few hours in a classroom can't magically negate, change or dismiss a constant, aggressive indoctrination of irresponsibility and neglect.
Maybe you're right, though. It isn't the Teachers fault? Then who? As I said before, it's the people who write the checks that buy the services of those teachers. But they aren't allowed to dictate what will be taught, when where and how. That power is diffused up into the land of the NEA controlled bureaucrats. Who pays the dues that allow that corruption and subversion of local democracy? Why?
Absolutely, the bureauocracy is made up of idiots and thieves. They're only in it to look good and avoid the slings and arrows of criticism. So they waffle back and forth between program after program (remember O'Neill's captivation with the "it's okay to fail" seminar?) cramming their rhetoric down the face of school after school. How can the public meet this challenge? As a whole, they aren't qualified to debate the finer points of educational theory. Just like Joe Shmoe isn't qualified to negotiate with the U.N. It's the teachers who know the bunk when they see it. But they're inside the system, and largely powerless. So many of them conform and the school board helps the process by hiring teachers who "buy in" to the latest trends. As more and more outspoken educators become silenced, the closer your vision comes to reality. And blaming the individual teacher when they're individually so powerless isn't helping.
Still, take away the union and the ability for the local puppets to exploit and abuse teachers becomes absolute. Reform? Certainly. But the NEA isn't going to reform until they feel the social conditions will allow them to survive.
My point exactly. No one is responsible for a giant snafu. The school board should be responsible for the school, with no federal and state lackeys of the NEA bogeyman hanging over their shoulders. The money is spent in outrageous amounts and nothing comes out. Where is it going? No one can tell.
Most of it goes to sports. That's why interschool athletics should be removed from our public schools. They only benefit one out of ten students anyway. Privatize sports leagues on a statewide level. It'll make education cheaper and more effective, with less emphasis on jock politics.
Oops, what about the millions of administrators? Why are they necessary? After all, we have a school board, a bunch of more or less dedicated teachers and the voters, who all want good schools for their money. Where is the short circuit? Wait... Those administrators are NEA members too! And the businessmen that they support by disbursing public money... do ya suppose there's a connection?
Absolutely. Most school administrators are politicians who know next to nothing about *real* education. You want to improve the system? Make it a requirement that administrators are certified teachers, who have worked for the public school system. Do you have any idea how many principals and superintendants have never been inside a classroom? Never worked with children? They're businessmen! And most of them were star quarterbacks! I've seen exceptions, but it's rare.
I can see by your next few paragraphs that you know what I'm talking about.
Oh, I agree with that. Teachers have no power in those schools. No one does. Power is excercised far away, in secret, out of sight of the local elected representanives of the local taxpayers. Teachers should be able to get rid of the bad apples. It's not the board that's the problem. It's the corruptionist ideal of American power politics as practiced by the education unions that's stinking the country up.
Should teachers have the ability to protect themselves against abuse and exploitation? Especially when it comes from the community? What's your system for that?
If you have a clearly defined elected leader of a school system, one that actually has the power to set curriculum, to hire and fire, to build, to plan and to make the decisions, then that person is the one with his or her neck on the chopping block when it comes out that Johnny can't read. That person will back the teacher in disciplinary matters, out of self interest. What you have now is a bunch of empty suits who just collect a fat paycheck to sign checks as directed and let the faceless higher ups take the blame.
Good idea. Like I said earlier, place harsher requirements on the elected leader. If he's a puppet of the NEA, his curriculum will be flawed. If he's been bought by a corrupt circle in the community, his ability to hire and fire judiciously will be compromised.
We all got our troubles. The puppet board obviously had a cash flow problem. They probably stole too much last year. Maybe they didn't want a choir teacher who couldn't cross train to do double duty. If his damnedest wasn't good enough, what can you say? The guy has to keep up. Don't they have lesson plans?
I'm not sure you understand. Teachers can not, SHOULD not be expected to be able to teach every subject (at least on a secondary school level.) Even so, they are routinely assigned to subjects they are not qualified to teach so the board can cut corners and athletics doesn't suffer. It's not the teachers fault if the school puts them where they don't belong. This isn't a matter of "additional training." You can't tell an English teacher, on the first day of class, that they are now a MATH teacher and expect them to "catch up." That's wrongheaded thinking. It doesn't work. It shouldn't have to.
I look at results. You have the NEA, the union that is the major backer of the Democratic party. That party sucks millions in soft money out of the teachers, then sets up a system where they are powerless? You are only powerless to do your jobs. If you didn't care about education you'd all be happy. Maybe you guys ought to take down your national leadership, because as I see it, you are being sold down the same river as the rest of us.
If only it were that simple.
Get real. It's a job and a pretty dammed good one at that. No radio towers to climb, no physical labor and no boss screaming at you to get it in gear.
You've obviously never been a teacher in the public school system.
Three months off.
Most teachers have to keep working weeks after the school year ends, and start working weeks before it starts. They get up early every morning to subject themselves to a host of immature children who, by and large, don't want to be there and don't want to learn. They deserve three months "off." For the sake of their sanity, they need it.
My neighbors are teachers and they seem to have new cars, paved driveways and a dammed nice house so I don't buy that starving teacher thing either. Do me a favor. Look up the federal yearly contribution to each child, then your state's contribution. Add in the local tax bite. Then count up the students in the school, calculate the raw amount, subtract the cost of commercial rent of similar school space in an office building and then divide the remaining money amongst the real working teachers. You'd all be driving Mercedes if they did it like that. So what is the real overhead?
Unfortunately, they don't do it like that. I don't know about the teachers in your neighborhood, but the teachers I see can barely keep up with the rising cost of living. And the government's not helping.
But I don't dislike teachers. They are just working stiffs, concerned with themselves. We are all to blame for being pliant enough to live with such incredible levels of corruption in the country, in every single sector. The legal bribery of federal and state politicians is the root of all evil.
I agree. It's a sad, sad situation. There's no easy answer. It's a terrible state of affairs where the only line of defense for a body of workers is a corrupt one.
I contend that if the government reforms the administrative system things will improve. Impose stricter teacher requirements, then let them be a self-governing body. Let the teachers at a school get together and form the curriculum. As a self-determining body, the educational process of the individual student will be WORLDS more effective. Let the teachers at a local level distribute the funds to the various departments. The principal and school board would provide a community-sponsored system of checks and balances. But with no "national interests" to protect, teachers at a local level, whose only power and influence extends to the community, will end up putting that money where it is needed the most. Eliminate school-funded statewide athletics. Now all the money goes towards academic interests. Create a rational, standardized formula for teacher salaries so that they can't drain money from the pool.
My point is, we need to create a system where the TEACHERS are allowed to set the curriculum. Where the TEACHERS are allowed to distribute the money for academic programs. Because they are the ones who have been certified and educated in this area of knowledge. They are the only ones qualified to make these decisions. Standardize salary to keep up with basic cost-of-living expenses so that the individual teacher cannot exploit the system for their own personal gain.
(Privitizing sports would be a GREAT first step.)
I understand the desire to increase local control, but how can you safely apply outcome-based funding? If the community says "Meet these outcome expectations or lose funding. Meet this standard and get more money," it won't work! That's why voucher systems are doomed to fail, and aimed at the disintegration of the public school system. Because the administrators want and need the money, and they'll take the shortest, fastest route to get it ... compromising the quality of that education. Then they'll wave their "standardized" data, criteria for which were not formed by real educators, in the face of the community and collect their checks. People will be temporarily soothed, even as the value of education plummets.
But I also understand why education can't simply be run by the teachers. Because then there is no system of checks and balances. So I say: keep the system of checks and balances. Create national standards. But teachers on a local level need to be given MORE power over (a) curriculum (b) discipline, and (c) they need to have a genuine voice where the distribution of funds are concerned. In today's system, the individual teachers, with as crucial a role as they play, are largely left out of the loop. WE, the people, need to let them in.
I'm just going to have to disagree. We have one of the best public school systems in the world, despite its shortcomings. International ranking is vastly overrated. If you're going to be fair, look at EVERY school system, not just the top countries. This whole mess all started when we got so panicky over Japanese test scores. We had to "reform the system" to catch up. We didn't stop to think that the Japanese only test and educate the very top percentile! Now educational philosophy is designed to destroy the bell curve. Everyone's a winner! To accomplish this, I heard one administrator say "The most important thing is for our kids to feel successful." Not BE successful ... FEEL successful. So we lower national standards.
Best for who? The kid who never gets anywhere in life because he was busy playing? The sad truth is that the average Japanese sixth grader is as well or better educated than a modern US twelfth grader, especially in math and science. But even their vocational students are as good as our best. It's because they have a Prussian model school system that treats children as raw material to be shaped, or army recruits to be trained. Education is a process with milestones that must be met on schedule. If they are not, then there is a problem with the raw human material. If too much material is wastage, then it's the teacher. The kids can feel themselves slipping and it is made quite clear to them that they are in competition. It prepares them for life.
I entirely agree that the bureauocrats are chiefly at fault here. To make everyone equal, to give everyone the "same chance" administrators are cramming conformity down teachers' throats. The system pressures them to lower standards, and to find "creative" ways of passing their students in an environment without discipline. Teachers who don't conform suffer. This is a huge factor in attracting more and more negative teachers. If the trend doesn't stop, we're all in trouble.
Ain't it the truth.
Besides, better the teachers in charge of the school than the students. If you ask me, society has failed the teachers. How can they be held accountable if they can't enforce discipline? If they aren't given the power to resist harmful doctrine?
They aren't individually corrupt, but any group will fall to it's lowest common denominator. Teachers don't want to have to prove their competence every day like the rest of us have to, so they use their political clout to make sure that they get a free ride.
That's an awfully broad generalization. I agree that people who abuse the system should be cracked down upon. The rest should not be made to suffer at their own expense.
Hey I, I'm not defaming them. I don't want to prove my competence either. If I had my way I'd laze around and drink coffee all day. The group I refer to is the national union.
The transmitter doesn't have self-determination. Teachers need to be held accountable for making education accessible. If their students won't swallow it, the administration and the parents need to back them up, like they used to. That's the only way education will improve. But now teachers have no support. They are villainized by society, when society (culture, the media) ought to be positively affirming a productive ethic on the part of the student. We advertise apathy. We send kids the message that there's no reason to look at education as something to be strived for. So they don't strive. And it's up to teachers to make them strive? A few hours in a classroom can't magically negate, change or dismiss a constant, aggressive indoctrination of irresponsibility and neglect.
We're on the same page, there. A local elected boss of the school, elected on the promise of success, would be able to eject said individuals, freeing up the resources of the school for use on the more promising students.
Absolutely, the bureauocracy is made up of idiots and thieves. They're only in it to look good and avoid the slings and arrows of criticism. So they waffle back and forth between program after program (remember O'Neill's captivation with the "it's okay to fail" seminar?) cramming their rhetoric down the face of school after school. How can the public meet this challenge? As a whole, they aren't qualified to debate the finer points of educational theory. Just like Joe Shmoe isn't qualified to negotiate with the U.N. It's the teachers who know the bunk when they see it. But they're inside the system, and largely powerless. So many of them conform and the school board helps the process by hiring teachers who "buy in" to the latest trends. As more and more outspoken educators become silenced, the closer your vision comes to reality. And blaming the individual teacher when they're individually so powerless isn't helping.
When the fix is in, the only thing to do is to kick over the table and start blazing away. That's what vouchers are all about. I know a woman who taught at a public school for three years, then took a pay cut to go to this grim looking little Christian school to teach. She is so up about her job at that dump that it amazes me. It's the worst, but the students are the best. Why? Because the church appointed a part time principal, who takes care of the non educational details, and he lets the teachers get on with the educating. If a kid screws up more than once, he's out. That place consistently tops the school district in every category of testing. What was the districts reaction? They tried to get it decertified. That's why I'm for vouchers. Sometimes you just have to cut the gordian knot.
Still, take away the union and the ability for the local puppets to exploit and abuse teachers becomes absolute. Reform? Certainly. But the NEA isn't going to reform until they feel the social conditions will allow them to survive.
Most people are exploited and abused at work. If they are skilled workers, in demand , they are treated well. If they are the guy who cleans the toilets, they are treated badly. Teachers aren't ever going to be immune to exploitation, but why have separate unions from other public employees? The NEA should be part of AFSCME, and confine itself to workplace related issues. Do the job, don't meddle in the democratic process.
Most of it goes to sports. That's why interschool athletics should be removed from our public schools. They only benefit one out of ten students anyway. Privatize sports leagues on a statewide level. It'll make education cheaper and more effective, with less emphasis on jock politics.
Oh yeah. When the local high school burned, taxes went through the roof. Enough went into the kitty to replace what was gone, and everyone breathes a sigh of relief. Then they announced this big six million dollar matching grant. They took all the money and built a gigantic sports complex. Then they closed three other high schools and merged them all into a new, huge one. Retired people had to sell out and move, because taxes went up 200%. The new mega school is is a toilet, a school on the Columbine model. This local tire dealer got pretty upset and ran for the school board. He got elected and then found out he couldn't do a dammed thing without the school district's approval, and that it was an appointed power with a fixed term. He quit in disgust.
Absolutely. Most school administrators are politicians who know next to nothing about *real* education. You want to improve the system? Make it a requirement that administrators are certified teachers, who have worked for the public school system. Do you have any idea how many principals and superintendants have never been inside a classroom? Never worked with children? They're businessmen! And most of them were star quarterbacks! I've seen exceptions, but it's rare.
I'm not sure you understand. Teachers can not, SHOULD not be expected to be able to teach every subject (at least on a secondary school level.) Even so, they are routinely assigned to subjects they are not qualified to teach so the board can cut corners and athletics doesn't suffer. It's not the teachers fault if the school puts them where they don't belong. This isn't a matter of "additional training." You can't tell an English teacher, on the first day of class, that they are now a MATH teacher and expect them to "catch up." That's wrongheaded thinking. It doesn't work. It shouldn't have to.
If they can teach, they should be able to learn. high school curriculum is simple enough. Look in the book, put a problem on the board, teach them to solve it and assign homework. If you went to high school and college, then it stands to reason that you should have mastered each of the subjects at some time. If they didn't, then what the heck are they doing as teachers?
I look at results. You have the NEA, the union that is the major backer of the Democratic party. That party sucks millions in soft money out of the teachers, then sets up a system where they are powerless? You are only powerless to do your jobs. If you didn't care about education you'd all be happy. Maybe you guys ought to take down your national leadership, because as I see it, you are being sold down the same river as the rest of us.
If only it were that simple.
It is. Join another union. There are two, now.
Get real. It's a job and a pretty dammed good one at that. No radio towers to climb, no physical labor and no boss screaming at you to get it in gear.
You've obviously never been a teacher in the public school system.
Teachers have to climb icy steel 1500 foot towers?
Most teachers have to keep working weeks after the school year ends, and start working weeks before it starts. They get up early every morning to subject themselves to a host of immature children who, by and large, don't want to be there and don't want to learn. They deserve three months "off." For the sake of their sanity, they need it.
Me too.
Unfortunately, they don't do it like that. I don't know about the teachers in your neighborhood, but the teachers I see can barely keep up with the rising cost of living. And the government's not helping.
Government will never help, because that's where all the education money goes. It is funneled into the pockets of "Ye friends." That's what makes vouchers such a good an idea. Teachers can walk if there is more than one potential employer for them.
I agree. It's a sad, sad situation. There's no easy answer. It's a terrible state of affairs where the only line of defense for a body of workers is a corrupt one.
I contend that if the government reforms the administrative system things will improve. Impose stricter teacher requirements, then let them be a self-governing body. Let the teachers at a school get together and form the curriculum. As a self-determining body, the educational process of the individual student will be WORLDS more effective. Let the teachers at a local level distribute the funds to the various departments. The principal and school board would provide a community-sponsored system of checks and balances. But with no "national interests" to protect, teachers at a local level, whose only power and influence extends to the community, will end up putting that money where it is needed the most. Eliminate school-funded statewide athletics. Now all the money goes towards academic interests. Create a rational, standardized formula for teacher salaries so that they can't drain money from the pool.
That's the way it works in a locally controlled system. The religious schools do it that way. BTW my friend is not religious and teaches a purely secular curriculum, including Darwinism. There is a Sunday school there, but she isn't involved with that. All the school's board wants is efficiency. They are willing to grant almost total autonomy to the teachers, as long as they can get good academic results and control the environment. All they are looking for is safety and efficiency. With vouchers, the federal matching funds would follow the children, so even poor kids could go to private schools. The costs of these superior schools are so low that they can operate nicely on just that component. If only the QB is left in the public school, that stupid football thing will be rethought. Let all the schools of thought contend. The teachers will always be in demand, somewhere. If they can get seven grand a student, maybe they don't even need a school to work in. It's the leadership that vouchers would put on trial, not the teachers.
My point is, we need to create a system where the TEACHERS are allowed to set the curriculum. Where the TEACHERS are allowed to distribute the money for academic programs. Because they are the ones who have been certified and educated in this area of knowledge. They are the only ones qualified to make these decisions. Standardize salary to keep up with basic cost-of-living expenses so that the individual teacher cannot exploit the system for their own personal gain.
Hey, with vouchers, there's no limit on a good teacher's earnings potential. My teacher friend is really pumped up about it. All the parents like the best and will try to get their kid in the best school, with the best stats, no matter how basic the facilities. Standardized testing will mean all out war between the schools, with no 'norming' permitted. Remember Aristotle's definition of a school. A log with a teacher at one end and a student at the other. One or two prefab rooms, three or four teachers, about $7,000 per student, at rock bottom... you do the math.
The will of the people is the ultimate authority. If the elected leaders can't run a school honestly, then the individual has to be able withdraw his mandate from the public authority and vote with his feet. The system we have now is tyrannical.
(Privitizing sports would be a GREAT first step.)
It should have never gotten so big. Sports should be slashed. If they want to play ball, let the local boosters provide all the facilities, OFF school grounds, AFTER school. What a waste of protoplasm a high school football coach is.
I understand the desire to increase local control, but how can you safely apply outcome-based funding? If the community says "Meet these outcome expectations or lose funding. Meet this standard and get more money," it won't work! That's why voucher systems are doomed to fail, and aimed at the disintegration of the public school system. Because the administrators want and need the money, and they'll take the shortest, fastest route to get it ... compromising the quality of that education. Then they'll wave their "standardized" data, criteria for which were not formed by real educators, in the face of the community and collect their checks. People will be temporarily soothed, even as the value of education plummets.
The public school system has already disintegrated. The rich are in high quality private schools. The poor are trapped in miserable hell holes, learning nothing. It is broken beyond reform. The administrators can do as they like, but students know when a school is crap and will move on smartly if given a choice. The money moves with them, so the powers that be will be forced to fight for the students. The ones that want to stay, smoke dope and finger paint amongst the garbage and graffiti won't bring in enough cash for the politicos to batten on, so the whole edifice of corruption will fall, freeing the way to reform.
The next move by the administrator class will be to try and bind the private schools to the same suicidally Kafkaesque rules that destroyed the best school system on earth. If you can't compete, assimilate.
But I also understand why education can't simply be run by the teachers. Because then there is no system of checks and balances. So I say: keep the system of checks and balances. Create national standards. But teachers on a local level need to be given MORE power over (a) curriculum (b) discipline, and (c) they need to have a genuine voice where the distribution of funds are concerned. In today's system, the individual teachers, with as crucial a role as they play, are largely left out of the loop. WE, the people, need to let them in.
Is the modern model of a school even the best way to educate? I think it came about by default. Why not have a freelance system? A good science teacher could have his own lab-classroom in his home, and a reputation based on the tested performance of his students. For the rest of the educational experience, students and parents could seek out similar local freelance teachers. If the optimum class size was twelve, that would come to $84,000 in income for each teacher, based on the federal funds per student currently spent. Call it a virtual school, without all the overhead pissed away on land, buildings and fleets of busses.
If they can teach, they should be able to learn. high school curriculum is simple enough. Look in the book, put a problem on the board, teach them to solve it and assign homework. If you went to high school and college, then it stands to reason that you should have mastered each of the subjects at some time. If they didn't, then what the heck are they doing as teachers?
It doesn't work like that. I'm not a professional teacher, but I can use myself as an example. This will be my second year as flute section leader in my marching band. In the time I've held this position, I've learned what my band director goes through every day, and I have much more respect for her. As part of the intro to the position, the drum majors taught me how to teach certain skills. If one of my freshmen needs help with roll-stepping or playing a passage, I can teach her to roll-step or play because *I've been taught HOW to teach it.* If she wanted to learn rudimentary French, I wouldn't be able to help her. I've taken the class and I know the grammatical rules, but I don't know how to teach them. How much do I draw on her knowledge of English? Should I reteach the parts of speech? How much time should it take for her to grasp it? Do I tell her everything, or present her with information and then let her draw her own conclusions and just makes sure they're right? What words are imperative to learn first? Education is not a matter of reading what the textbook says, it's a matter of understanding not only the whats but the whys and hows behind them. And that's something few people can do on their own.
My first impulse when i read this thread was to punch my screen. some of what was said has merit, but most of it is arrogant, uninformed twaddle. teachers unions do have power, but in a pitifully few states, most of them in the north and far west. in my part of the country, there are NO unions (to speak of), and the state governments hold education hostage. we've had so many stupid state programs cobbled together by conniving interests that have no thought for the children. my wife is a teacher, with nearly 20 years in the system and she dreads every january when the legislature convenes, because she KNOWS whatever manure they dish out it is going to burden her life just a little bit more. her ideal school (as some of you point out) is one where those that want to learn are allowed to, and the disruptive ones are shown the door (and possibly a more usable trade somewhere else, either in a vocational setting or prison). schools would be as nearly autonomous as is possible. according to her, the most progressive school system in the country is Minnesota's (a union state, by the way). the state school superintenant is appointed, there are no local systems; all state and federal funds are apportioned equally throughout the state. there are no Grosse Pointe/Detroit inequaliries. i know i will see equable distribution down here when, as Daria says, "man walks on the sun".