How to Improve Teacher Quality ?- Joseph Tramontana

[tramontanajoseph]

Today we are looking at how to improve teacher quality. We continue to explore our discussion on the efficient use of teachers with the goal of maximizing their effectiveness. Let’s take a look at some facts as we know them. Like other professions everyone realizes some teachers are better than others. Therefore, we know that teachingquality can fluctuateamong teaching staff. The greater amount of students that can be exposed to excellent teaching, the better the results will be.

A study done by Public Impact states that highly rated teachers are three times more effective than lower level teachers. Quality teaching should be paramount and these teachers should be relieved of all other duties except teaching. The idea is that through technology we can maximize the number of students that are exposed to the excellent teachers.

We also know that older students will be subject to college style lecture halls in the very near future. Some college classes can have as much as one hundred students in the class. Why not increase any high school classes to forty students with top teachers teaching advanced subjects like college algebra or calculus? As stated in a previous blog post, teacher quality is far more important than class size. I also recommend that since these teachers will have significantly more student contact time, they should receive greater compensation as well.

This model can dramatically reduce costs and increase academic achievement. Students will be exposed to quality teachers and class size will increase reducing the need for personnel. Through technology this teaching can be expanded to reach additional students at alternate locations as well.

The time has come to improve teacher quality and increase the availability of top teachers.

About Joseph Tramontana:

Mr. Tramontana currently serves as a charter school consultant for a large private sector organization. Mr. Tramontana has a Bachelor’s Degree in Business from Rowan University and a Master’s Degree in Management/Organizational Leadership. He also holds Standard Certificates as a Principal, School Business Administrator, and Qualified Purchasing Agent. Mr. Tramontana has received continuing education credits in Fund Accounting.

 

[Statistikhengst]

More students in a classroom = LESS individual time with any one particular student, unless of course you are expecting a teacher to work 24 hours a day.

Are you drunk?

 

[Bonzi]

Nothing will help until Parents start doing their part.... that's where the failure is.

 

[saveliberty]

Hold everyone in the educational process accountable. That means parents, teachers and student. Reduce the number of adminstrators to free up funding and also reduce their pay. Remove computers from the classroom.

 

[Unkotare]

"Remove computers "?

 

[AdamKescher]

For attracting higher quality teachers - could find a way to encourage industry experience in the subject. Perhaps active recruitment via LinkedIn, etc. of early industry workers with 1-5yrs of experience (Those most likely to switch to a new job anyhow) in their field and incentivize a desire to teach a subject in that field with free training or bonuses.

I think there is an added dimension to having been there and done that, the difference between teaching from a text and knowing it only as theory and having the ability to connect it to an audience and emphasize concepts in a subject with proportional weights on those concepts based on which ones are actually useful in industry.

Maybe a little like how every NFL coach has at least played some level of college ball. The ability to put yourself into the other person's shoes, while not necessary, provides an additional level of effectiveness in understanding how to connect with your audience. In this case the teacher, while teaching at a lower level has the ability to forecast to his student what will be important to him in college and in industry, both theory and application.

Learning is tied to motivation and the ability to forecast application to a student can make it less intimidating and also provide another level of motivation by answering the primal question - why am I learning this?

 

[jasonnfree]

For attracting higher quality teachers - could find a way to encourage industry experience in the subject. Perhaps active recruitment via LinkedIn, etc. of early industry workers with 1-5yrs of experience (Those most likely to switch to a new job anyhow) in their field and incentivize a desire to teach a subject in that field with free training or bonuses.

I think there is an added dimension to having been there and done that, the difference between teaching from a text and knowing it only as theory and having the ability to connect it to an audience and emphasize concepts in a subject with proportional weights on those concepts based on which ones are actually useful in industry.

Maybe a little like how every NFL coach has at least played some level of college ball. The ability to put yourself into the other person's shoes, while not necessary, provides an additional level of effectiveness in understanding how to connect with your audience. In this case the teacher, while teaching at a lower level has the ability to forecast to his student what will be important to him in college and in industry, both theory and application.

Learning is tied to motivation and the ability to forecast application to a student can make it less intimidating and also provide another level of motivation by answering the primal question - why am I learning this?

How about eliminating students who don't want to be in school? Maybe after a certain age, allow students to apprentice out to trades? This would cut down on class sizes also. Just asking.

 

[AdamKescher]

Sounds like a solid option for some students, people can make a decent living in the trades, and also can avoid boatloads of debt before getting there.

One size does not fit all, but the question is how many does it fit well, ok, etc. It's probably good to have options as well.

 

[Conservative65]

For attracting higher quality teachers - could find a way to encourage industry experience in the subject. Perhaps active recruitment via LinkedIn, etc. of early industry workers with 1-5yrs of experience (Those most likely to switch to a new job anyhow) in their field and incentivize a desire to teach a subject in that field with free training or bonuses.

I think there is an added dimension to having been there and done that, the difference between teaching from a text and knowing it only as theory and having the ability to connect it to an audience and emphasize concepts in a subject with proportional weights on those concepts based on which ones are actually useful in industry.

Maybe a little like how every NFL coach has at least played some level of college ball. The ability to put yourself into the other person's shoes, while not necessary, provides an additional level of effectiveness in understanding how to connect with your audience. In this case the teacher, while teaching at a lower level has the ability to forecast to his student what will be important to him in college and in industry, both theory and application.

Learning is tied to motivation and the ability to forecast application to a student can make it less intimidating and also provide another level of motivation by answering the primal question - why am I learning this?

How about eliminating students who don't want to be in school? Maybe after a certain age, allow students to apprentice out to trades? This would cut down on class sizes also. Just asking.

Not only are those who don't want to be in school wasting resources, many are also discipline problems keeping those who actually care about learning from getting as much as they want.

 

[regent]

This was the answer at one time. Our high school had a 75% dropout or ease-out rate, but then a new fear came into being, "Juvenile Delinquency" and citizens complained of kids on the street causing problems when they should be in school. Schools changed and tried to keep kids in school and off the street by making subjects easier, and not clamping down so hard on bad behavior. That's where we are now, and apparently this is it. Those that could afford private schools to avoid the riff raff did so, and the rest attended the new easier schools. The question becomes: are our schools for all even if it means baby-sitting fpr some students or should it be restricted to only the better students?
We must all so remember that one half of the new teachers hired this year will quit within the next five years. To date we seem to have no answer to the students that seem ill equipped or resists education.

 

[DGS49]

Not to be inflammatory, but the overwhelmingly obvious obstacle to upgrading public school teacher quality is the teachers' unions. But ignoring that for a moment, a few observations:

Teachers' unions fight tooth and nail to discourage and downplay quantitative evaluation of teachers, based on student test scores (the only tenable measure). They claim that teachers cannot reasonably be held accountable for learning, when so many factors are out of a teacher's control (bad parents, bad culture, poor facilities, etc). But if they were honest, they would be working with "management" to develop tests that were relevant, along with evaluation tests that took the outside factors into account when comparing a teacher with the standard. CLEARLY, it is possible to evaluate teacher performance based on student performance, but the Teachers' unions don't want it because it would mean that SOME TEACHERS JUST DON'T CUT IT and have to be removed.

It is almost impossible to remove a teacher for being a poor teacher. In the rare cases when a teacher is removed for something other than a felony conviction, it is because they didn't obey the required protocols, NOT because their students weren't learning. In my own little hamlet of Pittsburgh, a teacher removal was in the news last week. It had taken a couple years to do it, and reading through the story it came out that this teacher's "problem" had nothing to do with student performance; in fact, his students were performing much better than the standard, but THE RULES PREVENTED ADMINISTRATION FROM CONSIDERING THAT FACT! He was being removed for things like not standing in the classroom doorway during period changes! And the School district spent tens of thousands of dollars and untold administrative time to bring his firing to fruition.

The credentials of America's public school math and science teachers, in general, are abysmal. Almost NO DISTRICTS require a degree in the subject material (Math, Biology, Chemistry, etc), but rather promote those with degrees in "Education," who have taken 12 or 15 credits in the required subject. And it goes without saying that Education degrees have about the least academic rigor of any major.

This dearth of qualified math and science teachers exists in a society in which we have tens of thousands of degreed engineers, technicians, and scientists who would GLADLY teach for a few years or longer, if they could reasonably change careers to teaching. But the Teachers' Unions conspire with state Education Departments to build ridiculous barriers to entry into teaching as a mid-career change. Anyone wanting to become a teacher must figure on at least a year and a half WITHOUT PAY, while they get a teaching degree and do their student teaching, THEN they have to be willing to start at the bottom of the payscale.

As a result, the standards for math and science teachers remain at the lowest conceivable level, and NOBODY avails themselves of the process available to become a teacher, mid-career.

Clearly, as a society we are not serious about improving the quality of our public school teachers. The interests of the Unions trump the interests of our children, and we let Democrat politicians get away with it, while claiming endlessly to be "Pro-Education."

 

[Admiral Rockwell Tory]

Not to be inflammatory, but the overwhelmingly obvious obstacle to upgrading public school teacher quality is the teachers' unions. But ignoring that for a moment, a few observations:

Teachers' unions fight tooth and nail to discourage and downplay quantitative evaluation of teachers, based on student test scores (the only tenable measure). They claim that teachers cannot reasonably be held accountable for learning, when so many factors are out of a teacher's control (bad parents, bad culture, poor facilities, etc). But if they were honest, they would be working with "management" to develop tests that were relevant, along with evaluation tests that took the outside factors into account when comparing a teacher with the standard. CLEARLY, it is possible to evaluate teacher performance based on student performance, but the Teachers' unions don't want it because it would mean that SOME TEACHERS JUST DON'T CUT IT and have to be removed.

It is almost impossible to remove a teacher for being a poor teacher. In the rare cases when a teacher is removed for something other than a felony conviction, it is because they didn't obey the required protocols, NOT because their students weren't learning. In my own little hamlet of Pittsburgh, a teacher removal was in the news last week. It had taken a couple years to do it, and reading through the story it came out that this teacher's "problem" had nothing to do with student performance; in fact, his students were performing much better than the standard, but THE RULES PREVENTED ADMINISTRATION FROM CONSIDERING THAT FACT! He was being removed for things like not standing in the classroom doorway during period changes! And the School district spent tens of thousands of dollars and untold administrative time to bring his firing to fruition.

The credentials of America's public school math and science teachers, in general, are abysmal. Almost NO DISTRICTS require a degree in the subject material (Math, Biology, Chemistry, etc), but rather promote those with degrees in "Education," who have taken 12 or 15 credits in the required subject. And it goes without saying that Education degrees have about the least academic rigor of any major.

This dearth of qualified math and science teachers exists in a society in which we have tens of thousands of degreed engineers, technicians, and scientists who would GLADLY teach for a few years or longer, if they could reasonably change careers to teaching. But the Teachers' Unions conspire with state Education Departments to build ridiculous barriers to entry into teaching as a mid-career change. Anyone wanting to become a teacher must figure on at least a year and a half WITHOUT PAY, while they get a teaching degree and do their student teaching, THEN they have to be willing to start at the bottom of the payscale.

As a result, the standards for math and science teachers remain at the lowest conceivable level, and NOBODY avails themselves of the process available to become a teacher, mid-career.

Clearly, as a society we are not serious about improving the quality of our public school teachers. The interests of the Unions trump the interests of our children, and we let Democrat politicians get away with it, while claiming endlessly to be "Pro-Education."

With due respect, you have no clue as to what you are talking about. These are simply reposting of the talking points created by people who have not darkened a classroom door since they left high school.

I teach in a rural high school where all of the math teachers are certified in mathematics which means they had to have either a degree in the topic or sufficient coursework to merit a degree. I have a degree in history but my math courses taken at three different colleges are more than sufficient for a degree in math. Science teachers are the same way.

The problem with removing "bad" teachers is administrators who do poor jobs of documenting poor performance. Our current teacher evaluation system works very well in that regard, but takes time if there is no criminal act involved. Most teachers do not have tenure and work at the discretion of the principal. If a teacher is unqualified, it should not take four years to find out.

I became a teacher at the age of 36 after a career in the military. After another nearly 19 years in the classroom and a short stint as an assistant principal, I still get up in the morning looking forward to going to work. I still don't make as much money after 19 years in the field as I did the day I left the military as Navy LCDR. I make about $50,000 a year, which gets eaten alive because I fund my own retirement. The pay sucks but it is a good job. I also get graded on how well my students do on standardized tests despite the fact that I have no control on when they go to bed, how much they study, if do their homework, or anything that happens outside those school doors during the other 23 hours in a day that I don't see them.

My high school is an anomaly because in most schools, are forced to endure abuse by students, and administrators who just want to get through the day. The problems in schools can be tied directly to the disintegration of the nuclear family. All of my problem children come from busted homes where Daddy is gone, usually incarcerated, or they are living with aunts and grandmothers instead of Momma, because she went to jail along with Daddy.

I still have students with chronic absenteeism because they are staying home to take care of a mother with cancer, or some other health issue. I have kids who have grown up in a home where their mother has never held a job and the student thinks welfare is a way of life.

The next time you want to point fingers at teachers, learn the reality before spouting fantasies.

 

[mgh80]

Not to be inflammatory, but the overwhelmingly obvious obstacle to upgrading public school teacher quality is the teachers' unions. But ignoring that for a moment, a few observations:

Teachers' unions fight tooth and nail to discourage and downplay quantitative evaluation of teachers, based on student test scores (the only tenable measure). They claim that teachers cannot reasonably be held accountable for learning, when so many factors are out of a teacher's control (bad parents, bad culture, poor facilities, etc). But if they were honest, they would be working with "management" to develop tests that were relevant, along with evaluation tests that took the outside factors into account when comparing a teacher with the standard. CLEARLY, it is possible to evaluate teacher performance based on student performance, but the Teachers' unions don't want it because it would mean that SOME TEACHERS JUST DON'T CUT IT and have to be removed.

-There are more ways to evaluate teachers than just test scores, in my district we get observed by our principals and observers from the county. I've been observed twice so far this year. We're scored on a lengthy and in depth rubric.

-Teachers do NOT create their own exams. In my district we're not allowed to even see the exam at all (as in ever). Only the written portion (I teach English so my exams have a multiple choice and written portion).

It is almost impossible to remove a teacher for being a poor teacher. In the rare cases when a teacher is removed for something other than a felony conviction, it is because they didn't obey the required protocols, NOT because their students weren't learning. In my own little hamlet of Pittsburgh, a teacher removal was in the news last week. It had taken a couple years to do it, and reading through the story it came out that this teacher's "problem" had nothing to do with student performance; in fact, his students were performing much better than the standard, but THE RULES PREVENTED ADMINISTRATION FROM CONSIDERING THAT FACT! He was being removed for things like not standing in the classroom doorway during period changes! And the School district spent tens of thousands of dollars and untold administrative time to bring his firing to fruition.

-Not true, last year a teacher at my school was canned due to low performance in both student achievement and the observations I spoke about earlier. He had to sign a form that stated he was ineligible to ever teach in the district again.

The credentials of America's public school math and science teachers, in general, are abysmal. Almost NO DISTRICTS require a degree in the subject material (Math, Biology, Chemistry, etc), but rather promote those with degrees in "Education," who have taken 12 or 15 credits in the required subject. And it goes without saying that Education degrees have about the least academic rigor of any major.

-I majored in Business and teach English
-Since I'm not a education major I do have to attend trainers operated by the county specifically designed for non-education majors (for the record I have to pay for the classes).

This dearth of qualified math and science teachers exists in a society in which we have tens of thousands of degreed engineers, technicians, and scientists who would GLADLY teach for a few years or longer, if they could reasonably change careers to teaching. But the Teachers' Unions conspire with state Education Departments to build ridiculous barriers to entry into teaching as a mid-career change. Anyone wanting to become a teacher must figure on at least a year and a half WITHOUT PAY, while they get a teaching degree and do their student teaching, THEN they have to be willing to start at the bottom of the payscale.

-It was actually quite easy for me to get my temporary certification (which is good for 3 years), I earned it in about 2 months. The permanent certification is a lengthy process, but you have 3 years to earn it.

As a result, the standards for math and science teachers remain at the lowest conceivable level, and NOBODY avails themselves of the process available to become a teacher, mid-career.

Clearly, as a society we are not serious about improving the quality of our public school teachers. The interests of the Unions trump the interests of our children, and we let Democrat politicians get away with it, while claiming endlessly to be "Pro-Education."

It's not the Democrats who are to blame for the current state of the educational system-the GOP is equally at fault.


With all due respect and honestly....you don't know what you're talking about. When you actually teach I'll take you seriously.

 

[waltky]

Kenyan teacher on $1m prize shortlist...

Kenyan de-radicalisation teacher on $1m prize shortlist
Wed, 17 Feb 2016 - A Kenyan business studies teacher who speaks out against terrorism is in the shortlist for $1m prize for the world's best teacher.

A Kenyan teacher who gives classes against violent extremism is one of 10 finalists up for $1m (£690,000) prize for the world's best teacher. Ayub Mohamud teaches at a school identified as a recruiting ground for Islamist militants. He told the BBC he was excited and humbled by his nomination by the Varkey Foundation, which works to improve the education of underprivileged children. Kenya has been hit by several large-scale terror attacks in recent years. Last April, at least 148 people died when al-Shabab militants attacked a Kenyan university near the border with Somalia, where the al-Qaeda-linked group is based.

It was also behind the four-day siege in 2013 at the Westgate mall in the capital, Nairobi, in which 67 people were killed. Mr Mohamud teaches business and Islamic studies in the Somali-dominated Eastleigh suburb of Nairobi, which is popularly referred to as "Little Mogadishu". For the last five years, he has been discussing de-radicalisation in his religious education classes. In a leaked report from 2013, Kenya's National Intelligence Agency reportedly said that al-Shabab militants had been recruiting at Mr Mohamud's school, Eastleigh High. The teacher told the BBC's Abdinoor Aden that he believes teachers can contribute to global efforts against terrorism.

Ayub Mohamud says students need critical thinking skills and confidence to reject extremism​

He said that if teachers gave students critical thinking skills and confidence they would "be able to reject extremists' demands". Given the scale of the global jihadist crisis many thousands of Ayub Mohamuds are needed. Governments are focusing most of their resources on military might as they try to crush the extremists. But Mr Mohamud is in another battle - helping ensure the youth are not tempted to swallow the jihadist ideology and turn to violence. I have met people who were locked up with young men accused of carrying out the 2010 World Cup bombings in Uganda and with those responsible for de-radicalising Boko Haram recruits in Nigeria. They all highlighted education as the key because these men were unable to reason logically and so did not have the skills to counter jihadist ideology. That is why Mr Mohamud's work is so important.

Al-Shabab has been at war with Kenya ever since Kenyan forces entered Somalia in October 2011 in an effort to crush the militants. Nine other teachers have been shortlisted for the award, including a US Air Force officer who teaches in an Indian red light district and a Japanese teacher who gets his message across using Lego. In its second year, the award was set up by the Varkey Foundation, the charitable arm of the Gems international education firm. The first winner of the Global Teachers' Prize in 2015 was US teacher Nancie Atwell, who donated the $1m prize money to the school she set up in Maine. The winner of the Global Teachers' Prize will be announced on 13 March.

Kenyan de-radicalisation teacher on $1m prize shortlist - BBC News

See also:

Indian woman who teaches Mumbai's sex workers' daughters is among the world's 10 best teachers
2016-02-17 - Robin Chaurasiya is no stranger to breaking stereotypes. In 2009, when she was expelled from the US Air Force for being a lesbian, the Indian-American activist joined the successful campaign to repeal the discriminatory "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy towards gay military personnel. A year later, she travelled to India to start Kranti, an NGO that educates the daughters of sex workers in Mumbai.

Now, Chaurasiya has been chosen as one of the 10 finalists of the Global Teacher Prize, a $1 million award given to exceptional teachers who are transforming the lives of students as well as communities. "Kranti means revolution in Hindi and we call our girls revolutionaries or krantikaris," Chaurasiya says. "We want to revolutionise everything about sex work in India, the way that society looks at these girls and treats them."

Started in 2010, Kranti works with girl students between the ages of 12 and 20 years, who are children of sex workers as well as victims of human trafficking in Mumbai's Kamathipura red light district. Far from focusing on conventional education, the curriculum emphasises music, yoga, theatre, English and the arts. Kranti's students have given numerous TEDx talks across the world and held workshops for over 1,00,000 people. In 2015, one of her students, Shweta Katti, made headlines after she won a United Nations Youth Courage Award.

The Global Teacher Prize has been instituted by the Varkey Foundation in 2015. Chaurasiya and nine other finalists were chosen from over 8,000 applications from 148 countries. The other finalists include teachers from Pakistan, Kenya, UK, Japan, Finland and USA. The winner will be announced on Mar. 13, 2016.

Indian woman who teaches Mumbai's sex workers' daughters is among the world's 10 best teachers

 

[Elvis Obama]

Reforming the teacher education process is a good place to start, if we wish to improve teacher quality. Way too much theory and not enough practice.

We should not be concentrating on teachers, though. They are an important component in the educational process, but they cannot function without the support of school administrators, parents and, of course, the students themselves. We should be concentrating on making sure that the support networks which make the educational process possible are strengthened.

Focusing exclusively on the teacher, while ignoring the other aspects of the educational process, reduces teacher quality. Teachers are hung out to dry because they cannot be a compensatory force for all of the factors which derail an individual's education. So they quit. So they never learn to become effective teachers. We can't ignore the ridiculously high teacher turnover rate, and then complain about teacher quality. Address the factors which cause teachers to flee the profession and you will improve teacher quality.

 

[initforme]

Anyone who blames the teachers unions is full of fecal matter. Take a look at Finland, rated number one. No testing until age 17. Strong unions. Shorter school days. The difference is finnish people don't blame teachers for everything. In america, well, ......let's just say not so bright.