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The Unions are only part of the problem. You want to fire the shitty teachers, right? I'm all for that. Unfortunately, this is only a PARTIAL solution.
by busyant 16y ago
The Unions are only part of the problem.
You want to fire the shitty teachers, right?
I'm all for that.
Unfortunately, this is only a PARTIAL solution.
You also need to be able to fire the shitty administrators (see below).
AND you need to be able to "fire" the shitty students (troublemakers).
The school administrations are often composed of transient "revolving door" bureaucrats whose only goal is to pad their resumes with bullet-points of dubious changes that they implemented.
* Administrators will frequently alter programs ("we do physics in 11th grade? Well we're doing it in 9th grade now!") simply to demonstrate that they've made a difference.
* They will place weak students in classes where they don't belong just to maintain the appearance that they are serving a useful function ("Sure X failed biology and he'll be lucky to get into community college, but I'm recommending that he take chemistry b/c it looks good on his transcript").
* They will protect troublesome students to the detriment of other students ("You can't keep X out of class all the time. You're just going to have to learn to control him")
Students and Parents are as much of the problem as the teachers and the administration: There is often a pervasive attitude of entitlement without any effort amongst the students and their parents. Troublesome students are allowed to ruin the learning environment for everyone else. In an ideal world, you could kick those students out of class (or school), but in reality you can't (see ADMINISTRATION).
Amusing--but not uncommon--anecdote: My cousin is a high-school teacher who had a student who continuously disrupted one of her classes. She finally phoned the student's mother to tell her about her son's attitude problem. The mother responded with:
"Look...I don't call you to complain when he misbehaves at home. So, don't call me up because he's misbehaving on YOUR time."
That's not the union's fault, is it?
- forkandwait 16y agoGood point. I would only say that in the long term, the parents' and kids' alienation from the system as a whole is partly the fault of the system. A lot of schools in working class areas SUCK -- everybody knows it and feels stuck with it, so why would they feel like they should play along with the teachers when they call? Really, I just want to be able to fire the sucky teachers and administrators. I am really a downright socialist (with free enterprise a necessary evil that must be vigorously contained); I hate to be arguing against unions.
- wisty 16y agoUnions are a problem, but not the only one. The biggest problem (in my opinion) is how kooky the teaching education establishment is. This messes up teacher training, and worse, messes up the curriculum and gives the education bureaucrats terrible advice. The text book factories love it (for the churn it creates), but nobody else benefits.