Myth #1: Teachers make more than the average American. Their salary is not less than it should be.
Let’s take a look at those claims… the average teacher salary in the United States is $52,900 and the average salary for all workers in the United States is $52,544 so yes, teachers make slightly more than average. However, the average income for American workers with a bachelor’s degree or better is $77,293 (1) well above the average teacher.
Looking at total compensation (includes insurance, paid holidays, retirement etc.) the private sector average is $71,000 and the public sector average is $69,000.(2)
It should be clear that teacher’s pay lags well behind that of our similarly educated peers. It should also be clear why we have the paid retirement and insurance we do – it helps bring our compensation in line with our private sector peers. And we still lag behind our private sector peers.
Myth #2: Teachers should not have a “Job for
Life.” The teacher’s unions protect bad teachers and make it impossible to fire bad teachers.
Nothing could be further form the truth. First, it is important to be clear on what teacher tenure is and what it is not. “Unlike tenure for university professors, tenure for K-12 teachers does not shield them from dismissal. Instead, it's simply a guarantee of due process — that if a teacher is fired, it will be for cause.”(3)
Teachers and their unions are not the least bit interested in hiring or protecting poor teachers. Nor are teachers hired for life. Teachers and their union are interested only in protecting good teachers from abuse and arbitrary firings and this requires due process. The fact that poor teachers can hide behind these protections is really a reflection of administrators who are unable or unwilling to clearly articulate a case against a poor teacher and that we DON'T have any valid standardized way of evaluating performance. Currently, many administrators who were poor teachers themselves that moved on to get out of the classroom, subjectively write the final evaluation of teachers through a process where personalities and non-teaching agendas come into play.
Myth #3: We have to do something; we are lagging far behind other countries in education.
I do not know a teacher who does not believe that education in America has critical flaws. Teachers also believe that we are lagging behind other industrialized countries and there are grave concerns about our failure to keep up. However, how we come to that conclusion and how we measure ourselves against the world is flawed. (See the preceding article.)
The “Us versus Them” comparisons are flawed and causing grave harm to education in this country due to the reliance on standardized testing to measure student and teacher performance.
There are major issues with this comparison.
For starters, China, India et. al. Do not test every student, nor do they attempt to educate every student.(4) Schools in the United States (excepting private schools and in many cases charter schools) are required to accept and teach any student who appears at their door. This includes well qualified students, motivated students, unmotivated students, students with special emotional or mental needs ( read - not enough school counselors,) unprepared students, students with little support outside of schools, students who don’t speak a common language, the list goes on. Most of these students would not be accepted to, or be allowed to remain in most foreign schools. Up untell the Bush administration, most Americans were proud of this fact. Further, the fact that we have chosen to educate all children is the only socially progressive achievement we can lay claim to ahead of any other country.
This is in no way a complaint about providing instruction to these students or an excuse or even a claim that these students can’t or shouldn’t be taught, but simply a clear reason why the comparison of test scores is problematic at best, and faulty and harmful in the extreme.
Not only is the comparison flawed, it has led us to the point where we are basing our educational decisions on standardized tests and even trying to evaluate teachers on how well their students do on these tests. (5)
The problem is, a test does not provide information on how well a teacher has taught a subject, at best a test tells us how well a student has learned the subject. In the absence of other data, a test does not even do that reliably.
While there is plenty of research on the subject – enough to write a book – the simple explanation is this: a teacher cannot control all of the variables that go into how well a student learns. The support a student receives at home is far more important than what goes on in their school. How motivated a student is to learn will effect how well they learn.
Interestingly, China is attempting to rely less on standardized test and create a more American system. (6) Chinese policy makers are beginning to realize that teaching to the test has created generations of very good test takers who are unable to critically analyze and solve complex problems or creatively think of new ideas.
"We have just seen 43 states and DC adopt a Common Core curriculum that will have a Common Core national test (common “yardstick”) in 2014-15, and another name for that national test is “gao kao.” It will drive U.S. education for decades and we may never be able to get off of it. The American teacher was always unique in deciding what to teach, when to teach, and how to teach it…and the variability in creative questioning has gained us 270+ Nobel Prizes. (Score for China-educated doing research in China is zero…but that will soon change due to many who return after receiving a graduate education in U.S.) But now, partly from test envy and international ignorance, we have headed down a path to standardization in testing that we will not be able to get out of in our lifetime." (7)
Is this really where we want to head?
“But [the] intention is to use the Special Curriculum as a laboratory to experiment with a curriculum that will help all Chinese students, not just those who study abroad. Special Curriculum students may be encouraged to exercise and play, watch movies and read novels, engage in chit-chat and extracurricular activities. But in tests they do just as well as – or even better than – students who are given no choice but to study all day. This fact has profound implications for curriculum design and implementation in China. (8)
Scientific research and the experience of Finland’s highly praised education system show that a varied and flexible schedule that incorporates play and pleasure with study and work produces the best learners. Fitness and nutrition, music and arts, sports and games are not unnecessary distractions to learning but healthy supplements.” (9)
Myth #4: In this economy teachers are lucky to have a job.
No, teachers are not lucky to have a job.
This should not minimize the severity of our current economic situation, but unemployment is near 9% (10) meaning that if you selected 100 people at random 91 of those people would be employed. Having a job isn’t lucky, not having employment is unlucky.
In addition, many teachers worked very hard to earn degrees and employment that is relatively stable. Having a job now is the result of making good choices when selecting a career. Many teachers chose to forgo maximum profit for security and it is paying off now.
Myth #5: Why shouldn’t teachers be held accountable when everyone else is accountable for their performance?
Teachers are and should be held accountable. For good teaching.
Most teachers want to be the very best teacher they can be and that is impossible without being regularly and properly evaluated. It is difficult to make specific comments because how teachers are evaluated varies from district to district but it is fair to say that most teachers don’t have an issue with being evaluated.
However, teachers want to be evaluated on their teaching. Tying their evaluations and pay to student performance is unfair. There are far too many variables that are outside a teacher’s control. And unlike a manager in the private sector a teacher cannot interview potential students and pick the best nor can a teacher fire those who choose to ignore their responsibilities in school.
A teacher’s role is to teach the best they are able. To implement best practice and the best teaching strategies. To continually adapt to the needs of their students and to learn new ways to reach them and teach them. Additionally, an ability to form positive relations with most if not all of their students. As we all know certain personality traits and false expectations lend to negative impact on the learning process In those developmental years.
That is what a teacher should be evaluated upon.
A student’s role is to be in class and to complete the tasks a teacher asks – whatever those task may be – to the best of their ability. If a student does not do this, for whatever reason, they are not doing their job and they will not learn as well as they are able. A teacher does not control this, and no matter how well the teacher teaches a student who fails to perform their job will fall short of expectations and their potential.
We need to develop a tool to evaluate (A valid replicatable collective measure) how well a teacher teaches. and a fully funded nationally standardized program to help lower performing teachers.
1. “ 2011 Statistical Abstract,” U.S. Census Bureau, accessed February 23, 2011, http://www.census.gov/compendia/statab/
2. “For public-sector workers, a wage penalty,” Economic Policy Institute, accessed February 23, 2011, http://www.epi.org/economic_snapshots/entry/for_public_sector_worke...
3. Greenblatt, Alan, “Is Teacher Tenure Still Necessary?” NPR.Com, accessed February 23, 2011, http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=126349435
4. Compton, Robert, “2 Million Minutes: A Global Examination”, The Finland Phenomon, accessed February 23, 2011, http://www.2mminutes.com/
5. “K-12 testing,” Fair Test, the national Center for Fair and Open Testing, accessed February 23, 2011, http://www.fairtest.org/k-12
6. Schrock, John Richard, “Why Doesn’t China Get Off the Teach-to-the-Test System?” Yong Zhao, accessed February 23, 2001, http://zhaolearning.com/2010/12/29/john-richard-schrock-why-doesnt-...
7. Ibid.
8. “Education Reform in China: What the educators think,” OECD 50, Better policies for Better Lives, accessed February 23, 2011, http://oecdinsights.org/2010/03/19/education-reform-in-china-what-t...
9. Ibid.
10. “Table A-14. Unemployed persons by industry,” United States Department of Labor, accessed February 23, 2011, http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t14.htm
Sources:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=126349435
http://www.epi.org/economic_snapshots/entry/for_public_sector_worke...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Working_time
http://www.cnn.com/2011/OPINION/02/20/ravitch.teachers.blamed/index...
http://www.dianeravitch.com/
http://www.worldsalaries.org/usa.shtml
http://www.educationworld.net/salaries_us.html
http://www.payscale.com/research/US/Country=United_States/Salary
http://quickfacts.census.gov/qfd/states/00000.html
http://www.aeaweb.org/students/Careers.php
http://zhaolearning.com/2010/12/10/a-true-wake-up-call-for-arne-dun...
http://slatest.slate.com/id/2284732/entry/4/#add-comment
http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/chinas-education-prepares-students-t...
http://zhaolearning.com/2010/12/29/john-richard-schrock-why-doesnt-...
http://oecdinsights.org/2010/03/19/education-reform-in-china-what-t...
http://www.aare.edu.au/05pap/zho05780.pdf
http://www.asainstitute.org/2mm/index.html
Compton, Robert 2 Million Minutes: A Global Examination (2008), http://www.2mminutes.com/
Tyack, David B. The One Best System: A History of American Urban Education (1974)
Tyack, David B., and Elizabeth Hansot. Managers of virtue: Public school leadership in America, 1820–1980. (1982)
Archbald, Doug A.; Newmann, Fred M. Beyond Standardized Testing: Assessing Authentic Academic Achievement in the Secondary School (1988)
Alfie Kohn The case against standardized testing: raising the scores, ruining the schools (2000)
http://www.fairtest.org/k-12
No comments:
Post a Comment