Why Do Americans Love to Blame Teachers?

[initforme]

Those who blame teachers simply aren't that bright. Case closed. Your education is what you make of it.

 

[regent]

Wonder what they blame teachers for and not the schools? Most of the comments I've read or heard of teachers by ex-students seem to come with a smattering of fondness. When I think of my former teachers, two come up immediately, one mean and one caring: but both great for two different reasons. One was Mrs. Onimous and the other Mrs, No-nonsense- Wagner. Mr. Post gets an honorable mention. My life is better because of them.

 

[Rikurzhen]

Why Do Americans Love to Blame Teachers?
Healthcare has its critics, but few of them are calling for doctors to be replaced. Education is different—and as a new book reveals, it has been throughout U.S. history.

Why Do Americans Love to Blame Teachers - The Atlantic

As long as we have parents who refuse to be involved in their children's education or those parents who wish to impose ultra liberal or far right reactionary values on the rest of us, the war will continue.

Most honest paragraph about teaching that I've read in a long time:

"This is an especially pernicious dream since, as Goldstein says, one of the consistent findings in education research is that first-year teachers are not very good. In teaching, Goldstein notes, there is a learning curve, and "the curve is steep." If we want to improve schools, one of the quickest ways is to reduce turnover; skilled veteran teachers may be schools’ most valuable resources. Because of that, many of Goldstein's recommendations at the book's conclusion are focused on making teaching more attractive as a long-term profession. That involves increasing teacher pay, but it also means giving veteran teachers more responsibilities—for mentoring, for developing curricula, for working with peers to develop and evaluate programs. It means treating teachers as professionals to rely on, rather than as suspects to be policed."

I haven't even taught for that many years (15 years in education), but I've noticed that every two to four years, there is a flurry to implement a new set of standards (and standardized test), a new high-tech tool, and/or a new curriculum. And usually, it involves micro-managing the teacher. The trainer says, in what's supposed to be a reassuring way, "Just follow this guide!" but it is resented, especially by veteran teachers, and any who don't want to feel like mindless automatons who simply need to be "programmed" correctly.

Goldstein intersects reality a bit here, like with a Venn Diagram, but fundamentally misunderstands some important factors.

The learning curve is indeed steep and on-the-job training with an experienced teacher is a very content-rich way of developing the teaching skills of a new teacher. 100% agreement here. We need more of this. These mentor teachers are very valuable and should be rewarded. What isn't addressed is the near utter ueselessness of a degree in Education. There's a reason that most departments on a university campus look upon Education faculties as a joke and it's because they're not really adding value to the education of their students, future teachers. Their research is bizarre and shoddy, it spawns fads and resulting disasters as the fads are implemented.

Teaching really should ential more of an apprenticeship model of teacher training, not because this appeals to ideologues but because most teachers will tell you that most of the skills that they value and use on the job were picked up this way, and not from the leftist agitprop they endured at Education School.

I find it difficult to respect an "expert" who makes recommendations that are unsupported by evidence. For instance, Goldstien recommends increasing teacher pay. Why? This has no effect on student outcomes:

Teacher pay is typically based on teacher experience and education level, and these characteristics are commonly assumed to correlate with greater teacher effectiveness. Therefore, it is important to assess whether these qualities positively affect student achievement scores to ensure that the reward system is in fact helping school districts attract and retain the teachers who will achieve the desired effects.

However, when the researchers analyzed student achievement data along with teacher qualifications, they found that a five-year increase in teaching experience affected student achievement very little — less than 1 percentage point. Similarly, the level of education held by a teacher proved to have no effect on student achievement in the classroom. These findings have implications for the way in which teacher quality and effectiveness should be assessed and valued by a school district.
​

Secondly, it's a politically infeasible proposal. Does she propose firing all existing teachers and then restaffing with people attracted to higher salaries? No, she doesn't. I take it her proposal is to pay existing teachers more. Why should we? These people are in their jobs because they want their jobs. We gain nothing by boosting salaries.

To the big question of why we like to blame teachers, the answer is simple to understand. The primary dynamic in play is that teachers are the scape-goats. Teachers, being enablers of the Leftist State, have boxed themselves into a corner. The biggest problem in American education is the racial achievement gap and liberals say that this is caused by environmental factors and can be remedied by environmental responses. Hogwash. But teachers can't tell the truth. If you promise that you can fix the problem and you make no progress on the problem for 80 years, then people are going to blame you. Teachers understand that they're not really the problem but they can't say that it is the students who are the problem. Teachers bet on the wrong horse in the Nature vs Nurture horse race and now they're paying for that mistake.

The second reason that teachers are targeted so much is that so much idiocy comes out of Education factories. Learning circles, purple markers because red markers are too traumatic, whole language instead of phonics, constructivist pedagogies instead of didactic pedagogy, self-esteem boosting, cooperative learning environment instead of competitive learning environment, social promotion instead of merit promotion, peer tutoring, and on and on and on with idiocy.

It's a good thing that most students are resilient and unaffected by the idiocy that they're bathed in during school sessions. When teachers continually subject themselves to ridicule then it shouldn't be surprising that they are ridiculed. Teaching effectively doesn't require great skills, just skills, and some people have those skills and others don't. High pay or more education doesn't improve teaching. For those with the skills teaching is more like an art form and they can connect with the students and for those who don't have the touch the most effective process of teaching was seen in the Direct Instruction studies where teachers taught to script. Teachers freaking hated this method of teaching because it removed from them the ability to chose their own path, impressive student outcomes be damned. Society expects professionals to do their job so as to produce the best outcomes, not to produce the most fulfillment for the professional. What does it say about teachers when they turn their back on scripted teaching because they find it too personally restricting? Do schools exists for the personal fulfillment of teachers or to help students learn?

Teaching could clean up its image but for this to happen will require traumatic surgery on the Education Industry. There are too many vested interests in play here. What would Education Professors do if we closed down all teacher's colleges and went to a modified apprenticeship program with higher ed instruction provided by psychology departments and such?

There is no magic solution to fix our problems because our problems are student-centered not institution-centered.

 

[ricechickie]

Goldstein intersects reality a bit here, like with a Venn Diagram, but fundamentally misunderstands some important factors.

The learning curve is indeed steep and on-the-job training with an experienced teacher is a very content-rich way of developing the teaching skills of a new teacher. 100% agreement here. We need more of this. These mentor teachers are very valuable and should be rewarded. What isn't addressed is the near utter ueselessness of a degree in Education. There's a reason that most departments on a university campus look upon Education faculties as a joke and it's because they're not really adding value to the education of their students, future teachers. Their research is bizarre and shoddy, it spawns fads and resulting disasters as the fads are implemented.

Teaching really should ential more of an apprenticeship model of teacher training, not because this appeals to ideologues but because most teachers will tell you that most of the skills that they value and use on the job were picked up this way, and not from the leftist agitprop they endured at Education School.

I find it difficult to respect an "expert" who makes recommendations that are unsupported by evidence. For instance, Goldstien recommends increasing teacher pay. Why? This has no effect on student outcomes:

Teacher pay is typically based on teacher experience and education level, and these characteristics are commonly assumed to correlate with greater teacher effectiveness. Therefore, it is important to assess whether these qualities positively affect student achievement scores to ensure that the reward system is in fact helping school districts attract and retain the teachers who will achieve the desired effects.

However, when the researchers analyzed student achievement data along with teacher qualifications, they found that a five-year increase in teaching experience affected student achievement very little — less than 1 percentage point. Similarly, the level of education held by a teacher proved to have no effect on student achievement in the classroom. These findings have implications for the way in which teacher quality and effectiveness should be assessed and valued by a school district.
​

Secondly, it's a politically infeasible proposal. Does she propose firing all existing teachers and then restaffing with people attracted to higher salaries? No, she doesn't. I take it her proposal is to pay existing teachers more. Why should we? These people are in their jobs because they want their jobs. We gain nothing by boosting salaries.

To the big question of why we like to blame teachers, the answer is simple to understand. The primary dynamic in play is that teachers are the scape-goats. Teachers, being enablers of the Leftist State, have boxed themselves into a corner. The biggest problem in American education is the racial achievement gap and liberals say that this is caused by environmental factors and can be remedied by environmental responses. Hogwash. But teachers can't tell the truth. If you promise that you can fix the problem and you make no progress on the problem for 80 years, then people are going to blame you. Teachers understand that they're not really the problem but they can't say that it is the students who are the problem. Teachers bet on the wrong horse in the Nature vs Nurture horse race and now they're paying for that mistake.

The second reason that teachers are targeted so much is that so much idiocy comes out of Education factories. Learning circles, purple markers because red markers are too traumatic, whole language instead of phonics, constructivist pedagogies instead of didactic pedagogy, self-esteem boosting, cooperative learning environment instead of competitive learning environment, social promotion instead of merit promotion, peer tutoring, and on and on and on with idiocy.

It's a good thing that most students are resilient and unaffected by the idiocy that they're bathed in during school sessions. When teachers continually subject themselves to ridicule then it shouldn't be surprising that they are ridiculed. Teaching effectively doesn't require great skills, just skills, and some people have those skills and others don't. High pay or more education doesn't improve teaching. For those with the skills teaching is more like an art form and they can connect with the students and for those who don't have the touch the most effective process of teaching was seen in the Direct Instruction studies where teachers taught to script. Teachers freaking hated this method of teaching because it removed from them the ability to chose their own path, impressive student outcomes be damned. Society expects professionals to do their job so as to produce the best outcomes, not to produce the most fulfillment for the professional. What does it say about teachers when they turn their back on scripted teaching because they find it too personally restricting? Do schools exists for the personal fulfillment of teachers or to help students learn?

Teaching could clean up its image but for this to happen will require traumatic surgery on the Education Industry. There are too many vested interests in play here. What would Education Professors do if we closed down all teacher's colleges and went to a modified apprenticeship program with higher ed instruction provided by psychology departments and such?

There is no magic solution to fix our problems because our problems are student-centered not institution-centered.

Too much for me to address at this time. But I thank you for this thoughtful post. I like the idea of apprenticeship-style training for teachers. Subject matter rarely changes, but as you and I have both said, every few years there's a new fad as far as testing, standards, and curriculum. I reject all of them. I am in a fortunate position to be able to teach consistently over these years, picking up what works, discarding what doesn't. I teach in a private school, and my primary goal is following the student.

 

[JakeStarkey]

Increased teacher pay will result in increased teacher retention.

Besides, increasing pay is the right thing to do.

 

[Samson]

Being in union does not make a teacher better or worse.

Agreed, and no one has implied otherwise in the OP or elsewhere that I can see.

 

[Samson]

Increased teacher pay will result in increased teacher retention.

Besides, increasing pay is the right thing to do.

Increased pay to what level? $100,000/yr? $1,000,000/yr?

As a result of current pay levels, is there ta teacher shortage? If not, then how do you justify the statement that they need increased pay? How do you know teachers leave teaching because NO amount of money would make them stay?

 

[JakeStarkey]

(1) Teacher wastage is severe in many states.

(2) Increased pay is always appropriate for retention of good professionals.

(3) I do know teachers who have left the field because the golden handcuffs were not worth it.

(4) A close relative of mine left an East Texas public college because the bosses wanted their teachers to 'baby sit' DL high school students. The cousin was ill and took the sick leave and left.

 

[Samson]

To the big question of why we like to blame teachers, the answer is simple to understand. The primary dynamic in play is that teachers are the scape-goats. Teachers, being enablers of the Leftist State, have boxed themselves into a corner. The biggest problem in American education is the racial achievement gap and liberals say that this is caused by environmental factors and can be remedied by environmental responses. Hogwash. But teachers can't tell the truth. If you promise that you can fix the problem and you make no progress on the problem for 80 years, then people are going to blame you. Teachers understand that they're not really the problem but they can't say that it is the students who are the problem. Teachers bet on the wrong horse in the Nature vs Nurture horse race and now they're paying for that mistake..

Not sure what the point was of this, "enablers of the Leftist State......racial achievement gap....liberals say this is caused by environmental factors...." You seem to be saying that teachers are hated because you (and presumably the rest of the entire USA) don't agree with some ideological, partisan inspired prejudged opinion about the education system in particular, and a vague reference to Nature vs. Nuture.

This seems improbable, given that the opposing partisan POV is just as, if not more popular.

The second reason that teachers are targeted so much is that so much idiocy comes out of Education factories. Learning circles, purple markers because red markers are too traumatic, whole language instead of phonics, constructivist pedagogies instead of didactic pedagogy, self-esteem boosting, cooperative learning environment instead of competitive learning environment, social promotion instead of merit promotion, peer tutoring, and on and on and on with idiocy.[quote/]

I agree here: People don't like what they don't understand, and Educrats have done their best to make whatever-the-hell flavor curriculum of the year incomprehensible to the average parent. May not necessarily be the teacher's fault that they're forced to change curriculum into some UNKNOWN METHOD, but they bear the public outrage.

 

[Samson]

(1) Teacher wastage is severe in many states.

"Wastage?"

For example, which in what state is this "severe?"

 

[regent]

Being in union does not make a teacher better or worse.

The bottom line is that teachers are selected by politicians, what is taught is selected by politicans, what textbooks are used is a political decision and on down the line. Schools are political strongholds except for one group, and that group are the tenured teachers; to make schools totally political, states must get rid of tenure.

 

[Rikurzhen]

To the big question of why we like to blame teachers, the answer is simple to understand. The primary dynamic in play is that teachers are the scape-goats. Teachers, being enablers of the Leftist State, have boxed themselves into a corner. The biggest problem in American education is the racial achievement gap and liberals say that this is caused by environmental factors and can be remedied by environmental responses. Hogwash. But teachers can't tell the truth. If you promise that you can fix the problem and you make no progress on the problem for 80 years, then people are going to blame you. Teachers understand that they're not really the problem but they can't say that it is the students who are the problem. Teachers bet on the wrong horse in the Nature vs Nurture horse race and now they're paying for that mistake..

Not sure what the point was of this, "enablers of the Leftist State......racial achievement gap....liberals say this is caused by environmental factors...." You seem to be saying that teachers are hated because you (and presumably the rest of the entire USA) don't agree with some ideological, partisan inspired prejudged opinion about the education system in particular, and a vague reference to Nature vs. Nuture.

Here's the point. Job #1 of schools used to be "Take each student and teach them so that they reach to their maximum potential." This is very individual-student focused. That viewpoint is dead and buried. The mission of schooling has shifted. Job #1 is now this "Close the Achievement Gap." The welfare of the individual student is now secondary to the group focus. This is where the public angst lies. This is at the heart of the reforms. Teachers and education professionals have promised that they can fix this problem. Everything they try, carrot and stick, going so far as (NCLB) punishing teachers and schools if they fail, hasn't worked. So we have this unsolvable racial achievement gap problem and then on top of this we overlay the traumatic demographic changes which are occurring very rapidly in many schools and we see slipping scores, slipping performance and teachers and educational professionals, after promising that they could fix the problem, can't do anything about it. If you break down the student performance by race, Asian-American students are the 2nd best performing Asian students in the world, beat only by the students of ONE CHINESE CITY, Shanghai and white-American students are the 2nd best performing white students in the world, beat only the the students of Finland. How the hell is that possible if all students are exposed to the same education material, to the same methods, and in most cases to the same schools and teachers? We don't have racially segregated schools and we don't have different curriculums sorted by race. What the teacher is directing to the student is the same for every student, but the students are all different. The student is the limiting factor. You may know this phenomenon by the phrase "You can lead a horse to water but you can't make him drink."

So the upshot here is that teachers are the scapegoat. They promised that they could fix the problem because they don't believe, at least publicly, in genetics, and they've failed to deliver their promises. They can't say "The students are the problem."

 

[JakeStarkey]

(1) Teacher wastage is severe in many states.

"Wastage?"

For example, which in what state is this "severe?"

Go be quarrelsome elsewhere. That you don't accept common knowledge when you yourself have had teachers tell you why they weren't staying means that you are wasting all of our time.

 

[JakeStarkey]

"enablers of the Leftist State......racial achievement gap....liberals say this is caused by environmental factors...." Rik, can you be any more transparent that you have a far right agenda not compatible with American values.

 

[C_Clayton_Jones]

Why Do Americans Love to Blame Teachers?

Ignorance, for the most part, of what it is to teach, what's involved in teaching, and what it's actually like to be in a classroom.


Teachers are a visible and easy scapegoat, subject to blame for problems having nothing to do with teachers, problems that are often complex and that cannot be solved by simplistic 'solutions.'


And of course much of it has to do with failed, errant conservative dogma, blindly hostile to everything 'public sector.'

 

[Samson]

(1) Teacher wastage is severe in many states.

"Wastage?"

For example, which in what state is this "severe?"

Go be quarrelsome elsewhere. That you don't accept common knowledge when you yourself have had teachers tell you why they weren't staying means that you are wasting all of our time.

By asking for ONE example of whatever it is you're babbling about I'm, "Quarrelsome."

Clearly you don't really know shit about what you're posting.

 

[Rikurzhen]

"enablers of the Leftist State......racial achievement gap....liberals say this is caused by environmental factors...." Rik, can you be any more transparent that you have a far right agenda not compatible with American values.

As I communicated to you elsewhere, you sacrifice your own kids to what you think are "American values" and let other parents save their kids from the harm of these "American values" that you champion. It's funny how an 88% white nation was in violation of "American values" but the creation of a minority white nation is being true to "American values."

You know, I don't think that you're using the term "American values" correctly.

 

[CrusaderFrank]

All we can say for certain is that since Progressives took over our educational system it has gotten progressively worse. Our students are no longer competitive in world competitions and finish consistently with other Third world under-performers.

We're the biggest spender on "Education", so that's not the issue, the problem must be in the system

 

[bodecea]

Being in union does not make a teacher better or worse.

The bottom line is that teachers are selected by politicians, what is taught is selected by politicans, what textbooks are used is a political decision and on down the line. Schools are political strongholds except for one group, and that group are the tenured teachers; to make schools totally political, states must get rid of tenure.

Some states have already done so. Are they better states in which to get an education now?

 

[JakeStarkey]

The nice thing is that Frank and Rik's world is not going to come about.