Here's How Obama Can Fix Education

[PoliticalChic]

They need to get serious about accountability. The unions want it eviscerated, and many Democrats are eager to sing their tune: denouncing No Child Left Behind, excoriating standardized tests, opposing consequences for poor performance, and demanding more money.

Read full article here: Change Our Public Schools Need - WSJ.com

and

The beauty of Ms. Rhee's tenure reform is that it would use financial incentives to help the best teachers. Unions love to say they are underpaid professionals. Ms. Rhee agrees. Under her reform, teachers willing to be judged on their worth could earn up to $130,000 a year. Her price: Disburse money as is in the real world -- on merit.

Rhee-Forming D.C. Schools - WSJ.com

 

[random3434]

The first is Barack Obama, the party's new leader. He has hinted at a willingness to break with the teachers' unions, and his massive success at decentralized fund raising and recruiting volunteers may enable him to do that. He talks -- vaguely -- about removing mediocre teachers, holding educators accountable, basing pay on performance, and expanding school choice. But his positions on these scores are hedged with qualifications, and his education agenda as a whole is mainly (not entirely) a laundry list of typical Democratic ideas.

The second basis for optimism is that two new groups that speak for disadvantaged kids -- the Education Equality Project and Democrats for Education Reform -- have finally stood up within the party and spoken out against the unions. Including key figures such as Cory Booker, Joel Klein, Michelle Rhee and Al Sharpton, these groups want real accountability, they want more school choice, they want to end restrictive work rules -- and they insist that children come first. This internal rebellion is one of the most important developments in modern American education.

Sounds good to me!

I've been teaching in the inner city for 12 years now, and I AM NOT a member of the union.


There are many things that need to be changed in education, it's not all going to happen overnight folks.

 

[Walt]

It seems to me our education system has gotten worse the more the feds try to make it better. Put the power back in the hands of the communities to run their own schools.

 

[PoliticalChic]

It seems to me our education system has gotten worse the more the feds try to make it better. Put the power back in the hands of the communities to run their own schools.

The feds have almost zero influence on the schools. Federal funds make up a very small part of school budgets. Best thing that has happened to schools was NCLB: Data must inform policy! The real problem are the educrats, that means the communities running schools. There must be uniformity and accountability. The unions are for teachers not for kids.

 

[Angel Heart]

The feds have almost zero influence on the schools. Federal funds make up a very small part of school budgets. Best thing that has happened to schools was NCLB: Data must inform policy! The real problem are the educrats, that means the communities running schools. There must be uniformity and accountability. The unions are for teachers not for kids.

ITA

The unions don't care about the kids , It's all about keeping teachers in their union in their jobs regardless of their performance.

 

[Orange_Juice]

How in the world do you "evaluate" teachers? A bad teacher teaching really good kids will get high marks while a very good teacher teaching a bunch of scum bags will be told they are terrible and that's its a shame to call them a teacher

 

[Mr. H.]

Why Bad Teachers Survive:

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/...-dismissal-gfx.eps-20110226,0,3378793.graphic

 

[editec]

They need to get serious about accountability. The unions want it eviscerated, and many Democrats are eager to sing their tune: denouncing No Child Left Behind, excoriating standardized tests, opposing consequences for poor performance, and demanding more money.

Read full article here: Change Our Public Schools Need - WSJ.com

and

The beauty of Ms. Rhee's tenure reform is that it would use financial incentives to help the best teachers. Unions love to say they are underpaid professionals. Ms. Rhee agrees. Under her reform, teachers willing to be judged on their worth could earn up to $130,000 a year. Her price: Disburse money as is in the real world -- on merit.

Rhee-Forming D.C. Schools - WSJ.com

I read it.

It speaks to results but does not address the path to getting those results other than getting rid of unions which, because according to its author, unions oppose all progress and apparently want to NOT educate the children.

Saying one wants accountability does not tell us how to get accountability.

Saying we need to put the children first does not tell us how to do that.

It mentions school choice, as thought most students in most cities do not already have choice. They do.

This isn't a HOW TO list this is a WHAT WE WOULD LIKE list.

 

[jillian]

They need to get serious about accountability. The unions want it eviscerated, and many Democrats are eager to sing their tune: denouncing No Child Left Behind, excoriating standardized tests, opposing consequences for poor performance, and demanding more money.

Read full article here: Change Our Public Schools Need - WSJ.com

and

The beauty of Ms. Rhee's tenure reform is that it would use financial incentives to help the best teachers. Unions love to say they are underpaid professionals. Ms. Rhee agrees. Under her reform, teachers willing to be judged on their worth could earn up to $130,000 a year. Her price: Disburse money as is in the real world -- on merit.

Rhee-Forming D.C. Schools - WSJ.com

I read it.

It speaks to results but does not address the path to getting those results other than getting rid of unions which, because according to its author, unions oppose all progress and apparently want to NOT educate the children.

Saying one wants accountability does not tell us how to get accountability.

Saying we need to put the children first does not tell us how to do that.

It mentions school choice, as thought most students in most cities do not already have choice. They do.

This isn't a HOW TO list this is a WHAT WE WOULD LIKE list.

it's a union bashing list. it also ignores reality which is that teachers are constantly held accountable. at least in nyc, they are constantly being measured by how their kids do on standardized tests like the ELA and Math exams. that does not mean that every teacher is great. but most work hard to be the best teachers they can be.

the union bashers won't be happy until government pays for their kids to be taught that the earth is 6,000 years old.

and, frankly, people who don't send their kids to school shouldn't really be opining about a system they have no contact with.

the same people who want to break the unions and destroy working class teachers and schools they work in are the ones who want to defund the schools by raping them of their funds in the form of private (read: parochial) school vouchers.