Education: Fire, Not Hire!

[bripat9643]

You are wrong. But, in your heart, you knew that.

Nope. I am wholly correct.
The teachers unions are not totally at fault - however there is no chance of real improvement without abolishing the union system in our schools. And a whooooole lot of teachers will say the same.

So, your suggestion is we fix the schools by first turning teachers into second class citizens. An interesting approach. Somehow, I doubt a whoooooole lot of teachers will agree.

So everyone who isn't in a union is a second class citizen? That would include almost all the people who pay teachers' salaries. You just spit on all the people who pay the bills.

Teachers are not the problem and the union is not the problem. They are just an easy scapegoat.

Government control is the problem.

 

[bripat9643]

Administrations of schools are top-heavy, teachers are not part of that. We basically have enough staff to barely get by.
Actual cases in point:
My average class size last year was 28 students (room had 30 desks). We were 3 books short.
I had special ed kids in 2 classes where no aide was available for the class.
All Health classes that had special ed kids had NO aides at all. Tests had to be given only when an aide could slip free for 15 minutes or so to read the tests to them and the tests had to be very brief.
Those are facts.
We also had a special ed kid that required an aide to be with him all day (IEP required it).

When I went to school, no teacher had an aid. I never even heard of such a thing as a teacher's aid. Now you think it's a teach a class without help. That just goes to show how fa the work ethic has declined among teachers.

Class sizes were also closer to 40 students when I was in school.

 

[PratchettFan]

Nope. I am wholly correct.
The teachers unions are not totally at fault - however there is no chance of real improvement without abolishing the union system in our schools. And a whooooole lot of teachers will say the same.

So, your suggestion is we fix the schools by first turning teachers into second class citizens. An interesting approach. Somehow, I doubt a whoooooole lot of teachers will agree.

So everyone who isn't in a union is a second class citizen? That would include almost all the people who pay teachers' salaries. You just spit on all the people who pay the bills.

Teachers are not the problem and the union is not the problem. They are just an easy scapegoat.

Government control is the problem.

Not being in a union doesn't make someone second class. Saying a given class of people can't be in a union does. You are the one who wishes to take their right to organize away. I never said I would force them to.

Government control is indeed the problem. OTOH, how do you have a public school system without the government?

 

[old navy]

Administrations of schools are top-heavy, teachers are not part of that. We basically have enough staff to barely get by.
Actual cases in point:
My average class size last year was 28 students (room had 30 desks). We were 3 books short.
I had special ed kids in 2 classes where no aide was available for the class.
All Health classes that had special ed kids had NO aides at all. Tests had to be given only when an aide could slip free for 15 minutes or so to read the tests to them and the tests had to be very brief.
Those are facts.
We also had a special ed kid that required an aide to be with him all day (IEP required it).

When I went to school, no teacher had an aid. I never even heard of such a thing as a teacher's aid. Now you think it's a teach a class without help. That just goes to show how fa the work ethic has declined among teachers.

Class sizes were also closer to 40 students when I was in school.

Most teachers do not have aides. I have SPED students in my class and their needs range from various learning disabilities to being on different medications. I had two students last year with kidney issues. One was on a transplant wait list. Both had an open door bathroom policy.

"Now you think it's a teach a class without help." Huh?

 

[PoliticalChic]

Administrations of schools are top-heavy, teachers are not part of that. We basically have enough staff to barely get by.
Actual cases in point:
My average class size last year was 28 students (room had 30 desks). We were 3 books short.
I had special ed kids in 2 classes where no aide was available for the class.
All Health classes that had special ed kids had NO aides at all. Tests had to be given only when an aide could slip free for 15 minutes or so to read the tests to them and the tests had to be very brief.
Those are facts.
We also had a special ed kid that required an aide to be with him all day (IEP required it).

When I went to school, no teacher had an aid. I never even heard of such a thing as a teacher's aid. Now you think it's a teach a class without help. That just goes to show how fa the work ethic has declined among teachers.

Class sizes were also closer to 40 students when I was in school.

I had a junior high school teacher who had a hearing-aid.

Some of the kids would get called on, and mouth as though they were speaking.....

 

[squeeze berry]

Administrations of schools are top-heavy, teachers are not part of that. We basically have enough staff to barely get by.
Actual cases in point:
My average class size last year was 28 students (room had 30 desks). We were 3 books short.
I had special ed kids in 2 classes where no aide was available for the class.
All Health classes that had special ed kids had NO aides at all. Tests had to be given only when an aide could slip free for 15 minutes or so to read the tests to them and the tests had to be very brief.
Those are facts.
We also had a special ed kid that required an aide to be with him all day (IEP required it).

When I went to school, no teacher had an aid. I never even heard of such a thing as a teacher's aid. Now you think it's a teach a class without help. That just goes to show how fa the work ethic has declined among teachers.

Class sizes were also closer to 40 students when I was in school.

the aids are required by law for special ed students you ignorant fuck

PS some of the aids are not worth having. Sometimes I spend more time trying to get the aids to do their job than teaching.

 

[blimpo]

Administrations of schools are top-heavy, teachers are not part of that. We basically have enough staff to barely get by.
Actual cases in point:
My average class size last year was 28 students (room had 30 desks). We were 3 books short.
I had special ed kids in 2 classes where no aide was available for the class.
All Health classes that had special ed kids had NO aides at all. Tests had to be given only when an aide could slip free for 15 minutes or so to read the tests to them and the tests had to be very brief.
Those are facts.
We also had a special ed kid that required an aide to be with him all day (IEP required it).

When I went to school, no teacher had an aid. I never even heard of such a thing as a teacher's aid. Now you think it's a teach a class without help. That just goes to show how fa the work ethic has declined among teachers.

Class sizes were also closer to 40 students when I was in school.

When I went to school we didn't have aides either.

What we did have was across the board discipline.

EH (which many of us feel is a label for BRAT) and others with emotional "disorders" were NOT in the classroom (If they were it wasn't for long), but with this phase of "inclusion, you now have the psychotic in class with everyone else.
Two of these kids can turn a full class into a circus.
Today most kids' IEPs state they must have accomodations such as being pulled out and having the tests read to them. Without an aide, you basically can't give a test.

Don't get me started with inclusion. It turns classroom discipline into a nightmare.
Plus, a kid reading on a third grade level in the eighth grade should be pulled out to receive special help to raise the reading level. It does little good for that student to sit there and listen to a teacher rattle on about the French and Indian War while the kid is trying to derail the rest of the class with clownish behavior.

Once again it is astonishing to see the public ignorance on this subject.
Teachers' work ethic has not dropped, in fact, it has gone up to keep up with all the things thrown at them....

 

[old navy]

Administrations of schools are top-heavy, teachers are not part of that. We basically have enough staff to barely get by.
Actual cases in point:
My average class size last year was 28 students (room had 30 desks). We were 3 books short.
I had special ed kids in 2 classes where no aide was available for the class.
All Health classes that had special ed kids had NO aides at all. Tests had to be given only when an aide could slip free for 15 minutes or so to read the tests to them and the tests had to be very brief.
Those are facts.
We also had a special ed kid that required an aide to be with him all day (IEP required it).

When I went to school, no teacher had an aid. I never even heard of such a thing as a teacher's aid. Now you think it's a teach a class without help. That just goes to show how fa the work ethic has declined among teachers.

Class sizes were also closer to 40 students when I was in school.

the aids are required by law for special ed students you ignorant fuck

PS some of the aids are not worth having. Sometimes I spend more time trying to get the aids to do their job than teaching.

How true. During my 20 minute lunch break while walking down to heat my instant coffee, I'll see SPED aides sitting there drooling along with half the kids while the rest are bouncing off the walls. I'm not trying to be mean but that's the way it is.

 

[squeeze berry]

When I went to school, no teacher had an aid. I never even heard of such a thing as a teacher's aid. Now you think it's a teach a class without help. That just goes to show how fa the work ethic has declined among teachers.

Class sizes were also closer to 40 students when I was in school.

the aids are required by law for special ed students you ignorant fuck

PS some of the aids are not worth having. Sometimes I spend more time trying to get the aids to do their job than teaching.

How true. During my 20 minute lunch break while walking down to heat my instant coffee, I'll see SPED aides sitting there drooling along with half the kids while the rest are bouncing off the walls. I'm not trying to be mean but that's the way it is.

the aids I have are addicted to cell phones and internet
some are late ammost every day and come intothe class 15 minutes after the bell and disrupt my class

argue with me abour prctically everything

outright defy me

don't show up at allfortheir asssignment vb/cthey are outside smoking or at the grocery store

sleepin class

just sit there at watch me teach

then when I expect them to actually do their job they go up to the front office and complain about my behavior

Yes.some times they help.but it's a net loss mostly

 

[initforme]

"That just goes to show how fa the work ethic has declined among teachers. "

Add to that parenting today is subpar. If kids are struggling the very first place that should be examined is the home. This is a no brainer. Home life messed up? No dad around? No discipline at home. No meals cooked? Causes a ruckus in class. Refuses to do any work. Absent alot. Who's to blame for this? The teacher of course. Thats the way americans see it. Kid had better be proficient on the state test. Its hard to create a good product with defective parts.

 

[DGS49]

There is nothing inherently evil about unions, but in this country unions have evolved to be a very destructive force, especially in Academe. They fight "management" to get as much as they can, and they see it as their obligation to protect the job security of every single union member - especially the worst ones.

One of the major sections in every teachers' contract is the complex and impenetrable procedure for disciplining a teacher who breaks a rule. And every Bargaining Unit has teachers who are incompetent, lazy, and who should have been jettisoned years ago. But ask your local HR representative how many teachers got "unsatisfactory" performance reviews last year (I have, several times), and when you cut through all the bullshit the answer is ZERO.

Instead of complaining about standardized tests being irrelevant, the NEA should be in the forefront of developing tests and other evaluation tools that permit the schools to assess students' progress and explore new initiatives that might achieve some success. But the only initiatives that the NEA is interested in are the ones that mean more money or benefits for teachers (e.g., smaller class sizes).

The school system mirrors our country in many ways. Just as we have an "income gap" that keeps getting bigger and bigger (which I don't see as a problem), we have an education gap, where the kids from the best (generally) suburban public schools can get a fabulous education - equivalent to a good private school, while inner city kids are lucky they can learn the basics because of the classroom behavior problems, teacher apathy, and disengaged parents.

And ironically, money is demonstrably not the answer. Some of the most expensive school districts in the country (e.g., our nation's capital) have the worst educational outcomes, and parochial schools spending well under $10k/kid are kicking ass, as they always have (with non-union teachers making $35k/yr).

But honestly, is there any other factor in this whole picture that has had a more destructive effect than the teachers' unions? I can't think of any.

 

[blimpo]

"That just goes to show how fa the work ethic has declined among teachers. "

Add to that parenting today is subpar. If kids are struggling the very first place that should be examined is the home. This is a no brainer. Home life messed up? No dad around? No discipline at home. No meals cooked? Causes a ruckus in class. Refuses to do any work. Absent alot. Who's to blame for this? The teacher of course. Thats the way americans see it. Kid had better be proficient on the state test. Its hard to create a good product with defective parts.

People always say schools should be run as businesses.

Okay.

We are getting too many defective parts. Throw those out and we'll look for a new supplier.
Better yet, when they arrive defective we won't even accept them under our roof.

 

[initforme]

"But honestly, is there any other factor in this whole picture that has had a more destructive effect than the teachers' unions? I can't think of any. "

I can. Parenting today is far more destructive. Drugs. Split families.
Parents have taken the power to discipline away from teachers. Parents are why we have an entitled society. Parents are the ones buying ipods and cell phones for their kids. We have a generation of kids who sit and play games. Thats what they know how to do. So, technology has also been very very destructive to education. Theres a start of more destructive things.

 

[Trajan]

1. "In a high-profile presser on the economy last Friday, President Obama’s central proposal was to hire more public employees. Then, in his weekly address, he argued that hiring more public school teachers would allow the U.S. to educate its way to prosperity. His Republican presidential rival, Governor Romney, has recommended precisely the opposite...



2. ...let’s look at public school employment and student enrollment over time.

3. ...enrollment is only up 8.5% since 1970, whereas employment is up 96.2%. In other words, the public school workforce has grown 11 times faster than enrollment over the past 40 years.

4. If we went back to the staff-to-student ratio we had in 1970, we’d be saving $210 billion annually.




5. ...improved student achievement boosts economic growth. So if the 2.9 million extra public school employees we’ve hired since 1970 have improved achievement substantially, we might well be coming out ahead economically. So let’s look at those numbers…

6. Despite hiring nearly 3 million more people and spending a resulting $210 billion more every year, achievement near the end of high school has stagnated in math and reading and actually declined slightly in science since 1970.

7. ...the total cost per pupil of each graduating class from 1970 to the present. ... on a per pupil basis, a K-12 education has gone from about $55,000 to about $150,000 in real, inflation-adjusted terms.



8. The implications of these charts are tragic: The public school monopoly is warehousing 3 million people in jobs that appear to have done nothing to improve student learning.



9. Our K-12 government school system simply does not know how to harness the skills of our education workforce, and...

10. ... is preventing these people from contributing to our economy while consuming massive quantities of tax dollars. "
President Obama is Totally Wrong on Education: America Needs to Fire, Not Hire, More Teachers




Obama, again.....

Thinking that is not just wrong....

...but is deleterious.

You are both right and wrong, because you are lumping everyone into this category of "public employee".

In 1970, if you went into your typical high school you would have found a principal and one or two vice-principals. They would have been the entire technical, non-teaching staff in the school. If a student needed counseling, that would have been done by a teacher - who would have been assigned specific hours for that purpose. If a social worker was needed, the local government would have been called in.

Walk into a high school today and you will find it packed with full time counselors, psychiatrists, etc. I live in a county with a sizable school system. It's current budget calls for 14,777 teachers and 4,200 "specialists". These include career counselors, pshyicatrists and psychologists, social workers, athletic trainers, etc. We aren't talking about janitors and HVAC technicians or even the office staff it takes to run a large organization. These are people dedicated to things which are only peripherally related to education. Most of those staff are actually higher paid than the average teacher.

It isn't teachers who are the problem. We could significantly cut schools budgets and increase the number of teachers if we simply went back to the idea that the purpose of a school is to educate.

I clearly remember social counselors in the NYC public school I attended in the 60's...but more to your point yes, there has been an exponential growth in other direct teaching positions, agreed and on the district level too, what they call the ‘blob’.

I wonder how much of this is really necessary. I suspect we send kids to counseling more often now because we have allowed the blob to direct teachers to forgo discipline and send the kids up the chain because, well, if they act out, its because they have ‘issues’…..

The athletic dept. at high schools may have gown but I don't see that on the same scale as say other administrators, see; paperwork processors, office staff etc.

In addition kids at many of these districts, even mine, the home of a magnet school which my children attended, have turned the kids into panhandlers.

I don’t know how many school events and prgm.s I have provided hard cash for or how many ‘bargain/coupon’ books I have bought but there is a drawer around my house somewhere stuffed with them, the sales pitch being the school needed supplies, or so they could buy new uniforms for the soccer or football tea(s) etc…and I live in a district that suffers no lack of higher end property taxes either, that ostensibly is supposed to fund all of this , yet, I will add, there is no vocational training to be had.

Like all bureaucracies that are left to their own device, it has like a virus taken over the host.

Oh and as far as more funding, the latest Cali. School tax initiate will take a hefty cut to fund the teachers/admin. Pension fund, which the state neglected to fund for years as revenues in those funds, never met their rosy predictions, now we are supposed to pony up more money for the very same that was supposed to have been funded all along.

 

[blimpo]

There is nothing inherently evil about unions, but in this country unions have evolved to be a very destructive force, especially in Academe. They fight "management" to get as much as they can, and they see it as their obligation to protect the job security of every single union member - especially the worst ones.

One of the major sections in every teachers' contract is the complex and impenetrable procedure for disciplining a teacher who breaks a rule. And every Bargaining Unit has teachers who are incompetent, lazy, and who should have been jettisoned years ago. But ask your local HR representative how many teachers got "unsatisfactory" performance reviews last year (I have, several times), and when you cut through all the bullshit the answer is ZERO.

Instead of complaining about standardized tests being irrelevant, the NEA should be in the forefront of developing tests and other evaluation tools that permit the schools to assess students' progress and explore new initiatives that might achieve some success. But the only initiatives that the NEA is interested in are the ones that mean more money or benefits for teachers (e.g., smaller class sizes).

The school system mirrors our country in many ways. Just as we have an "income gap" that keeps getting bigger and bigger (which I don't see as a problem), we have an education gap, where the kids from the best (generally) suburban public schools can get a fabulous education - equivalent to a good private school, while inner city kids are lucky they can learn the basics because of the classroom behavior problems, teacher apathy, and disengaged parents.

And ironically, money is demonstrably not the answer. Some of the most expensive school districts in the country (e.g., our nation's capital) have the worst educational outcomes, and parochial schools spending well under $10k/kid are kicking ass, as they always have (with non-union teachers making $35k/yr).

But honestly, is there any other factor in this whole picture that has had a more destructive effect than the teachers' unions? I can't think of any.

Now we've gone in the opposite direction.

In Indiana, the ratio of eneffective teachers in a school must be equal to the percentage of kids failing the standardized tests.

75% passed, 25% of the faculty has to be rated ineffective or the principal isn't doing his job and must be replaced.

As this goes on year after year, eventually some pretty good people will be let go.

I can't imagine why anyone would want in with mindless rules like this.

All you education majors out there, if they haven't handed you a diploma it's not too late to change your major...

 

[squeeze berry]

There is nothing inherently evil about unions, but in this country unions have evolved to be a very destructive force, especially in Academe. They fight "management" to get as much as they can, and they see it as their obligation to protect the job security of every single union member - especially the worst ones.

One of the major sections in every teachers' contract is the complex and impenetrable procedure for disciplining a teacher who breaks a rule. And every Bargaining Unit has teachers who are incompetent, lazy, and who should have been jettisoned years ago. But ask your local HR representative how many teachers got "unsatisfactory" performance reviews last year (I have, several times), and when you cut through all the bullshit the answer is ZERO.

Instead of complaining about standardized tests being irrelevant, the NEA should be in the forefront of developing tests and other evaluation tools that permit the schools to assess students' progress and explore new initiatives that might achieve some success. But the only initiatives that the NEA is interested in are the ones that mean more money or benefits for teachers (e.g., smaller class sizes).

The school system mirrors our country in many ways. Just as we have an "income gap" that keeps getting bigger and bigger (which I don't see as a problem), we have an education gap, where the kids from the best (generally) suburban public schools can get a fabulous education - equivalent to a good private school, while inner city kids are lucky they can learn the basics because of the classroom behavior problems, teacher apathy, and disengaged parents.

And ironically, money is demonstrably not the answer. Some of the most expensive school districts in the country (e.g., our nation's capital) have the worst educational outcomes, and parochial schools spending well under $10k/kid are kicking ass, as they always have (with non-union teachers making $35k/yr).

But honestly, is there any other factor in this whole picture that has had a more destructive effect than the teachers' unions? I can't think of any.

first of all the unions don't have zero influence on policy or outcomes.

The reason DC public schools is a mess is because the students are not very bright.

Of course it's the teachers's fault.After all,they were some of the best students in school, so of course they are stupid.

 

[initforme]

If I were a teacher coming out of college now I'd head for a foreign country where they are respected and where education is deemed important. In america people talk a good game but really this country isnt all that interested in education. That is a fact.

 

[PoliticalChic]

There is nothing inherently evil about unions, but in this country unions have evolved to be a very destructive force, especially in Academe. They fight "management" to get as much as they can, and they see it as their obligation to protect the job security of every single union member - especially the worst ones.

One of the major sections in every teachers' contract is the complex and impenetrable procedure for disciplining a teacher who breaks a rule. And every Bargaining Unit has teachers who are incompetent, lazy, and who should have been jettisoned years ago. But ask your local HR representative how many teachers got "unsatisfactory" performance reviews last year (I have, several times), and when you cut through all the bullshit the answer is ZERO.

Instead of complaining about standardized tests being irrelevant, the NEA should be in the forefront of developing tests and other evaluation tools that permit the schools to assess students' progress and explore new initiatives that might achieve some success. But the only initiatives that the NEA is interested in are the ones that mean more money or benefits for teachers (e.g., smaller class sizes).

The school system mirrors our country in many ways. Just as we have an "income gap" that keeps getting bigger and bigger (which I don't see as a problem), we have an education gap, where the kids from the best (generally) suburban public schools can get a fabulous education - equivalent to a good private school, while inner city kids are lucky they can learn the basics because of the classroom behavior problems, teacher apathy, and disengaged parents.

And ironically, money is demonstrably not the answer. Some of the most expensive school districts in the country (e.g., our nation's capital) have the worst educational outcomes, and parochial schools spending well under $10k/kid are kicking ass, as they always have (with non-union teachers making $35k/yr).

But honestly, is there any other factor in this whole picture that has had a more destructive effect than the teachers' unions? I can't think of any.

"There is nothing inherently evil about unions,..."

Agree.


"is there any other factor in this whole picture that has had a more destructive effect than the teachers' unions?"

Absolutely.
The elected officials that rubber stamp each and every demand.

 

[squeeze berry]

There is nothing inherently evil about unions, but in this country unions have evolved to be a very destructive force, especially in Academe. They fight "management" to get as much as they can, and they see it as their obligation to protect the job security of every single union member - especially the worst ones.

One of the major sections in every teachers' contract is the complex and impenetrable procedure for disciplining a teacher who breaks a rule. And every Bargaining Unit has teachers who are incompetent, lazy, and who should have been jettisoned years ago. But ask your local HR representative how many teachers got "unsatisfactory" performance reviews last year (I have, several times), and when you cut through all the bullshit the answer is ZERO.

Instead of complaining about standardized tests being irrelevant, the NEA should be in the forefront of developing tests and other evaluation tools that permit the schools to assess students' progress and explore new initiatives that might achieve some success. But the only initiatives that the NEA is interested in are the ones that mean more money or benefits for teachers (e.g., smaller class sizes).

The school system mirrors our country in many ways. Just as we have an "income gap" that keeps getting bigger and bigger (which I don't see as a problem), we have an education gap, where the kids from the best (generally) suburban public schools can get a fabulous education - equivalent to a good private school, while inner city kids are lucky they can learn the basics because of the classroom behavior problems, teacher apathy, and disengaged parents.

And ironically, money is demonstrably not the answer. Some of the most expensive school districts in the country (e.g., our nation's capital) have the worst educational outcomes, and parochial schools spending well under $10k/kid are kicking ass, as they always have (with non-union teachers making $35k/yr).

But honestly, is there any other factor in this whole picture that has had a more destructive effect than the teachers' unions? I can't think of any.

"There is nothing inherently evil about unions,..."

Agree.


"is there any other factor in this whole picture that has had a more destructive effect than the teachers' unions?"

Absolutely.
The elected officials that rubber stamp each and every demand.

hopefully you mean demands of legilators that don't have a clue about the educational process
judges legislating from the bench and

parents demanding their child be cured

 

[DGS49]

Parents are truly another problem for the System, both as "helicopter" parents and those who are totally disengaged.

But giving collecting bargaining rights to teachers (including the right to strike) has proven to be a total disaster.

Again, if the NEA (and the other teachers' unions) were truly "professional organizations," they would be in the forefront of research on improved teaching methodologies, teacher and student assessment tools, and developing relevant core curricula. They represent the MOST KNOWLEDGEABLE PEOPLE in the academic world - the teachers - and yet this valuable resource is not used to improve the profession or outcomes.

Because they act just like a labor union. No difference. Get as much pay & benefits as possible, and do as little work as possible. And prevent anyone from ever being fired.

Nice.