6 ms·

The scariest part is that all the people I know who have no confidence in their intelligence ("Oh, I could never major in THAT, I'd have to take Calculus! I ha

by tdfx 15y ago

The scariest part is that all the people I know who have no confidence in their intelligence ("Oh, I could never major in THAT, I'd have to take Calculus! I hate math!") avoid the science majors and are majoring in education. I think that being a teacher should require a 7-8 year graduate education track similar to a doctor or lawyer, not a quick 4-year liberal arts degree that most people shoot for so that they only work 9 months a year. I'm not hopeful for the future on this one.

timjahn 15y ago
"so that they only work 9 months a year" Which, of course, they don't.
- parasitius 15y ago
  Exactly :) They work nine months their first year to hash out lesson plans and then repeat those plans thirty years till retirement
- anamax 15y ago
  > Which, of course, they don't. That's right - many of them have summer jobs.
  - _delirium 15y ago
    In some places that's possible, but in many places it's pretty impractical. At the high school I attended, summer vacation is June 1 - August 22, but teacher in-service days are: June 2-10 (end of semester wrap-up), July 11-15 (make-up days for students who missed finals), and August 15-19 (pre-semester preparation), which leaves two discontiguous 4-week breaks.
pflats 15y ago
A number of states require postgraduate degrees (and then continuing education) for teachers in order to renew their teaching licenses.
mentat 15y ago
Then we'd definitely have enough quality teachers at the rate the jobs pay. And they'd have no student loan debt either. </sarcasm>
impendia 15y ago
Funny you suggest a track similar to law/med school. In those progressions graduates can expect to make well into the six figures. If we doubled teachers' pay, lightened their workload, and most importantly did not require teachers to answer so stringently to administrators (and voters and homebuyers) who mainly care about test scores, I would agree this is a good idea. I have a friend who's a teacher, who works hard, and who is picking up boring temp work for $10/hour almost every weekend so she can get out of town in December. That's just sad to me. I have heard from people who know that turnover in the classroom is already high, even among people who got a 1 year intensive master's degree in teaching. In principle, I'd like to set the bar higher as you suggest, but the first priority is to make teaching an attractive profession.
- yummyfajitas 15y ago
  How light a workload do teachers need? As it stands now, full time teachers [1] work only 38.5 hours/week (on average). http://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2008/03/art4full.pdf http://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2008/03/art4full.pdf I'm not sure how increasing pay, further reducing work hours, and completely eliminating accountability will do anything other than buy teacher's loyalties in an election year. Incidentally, there is also little evidence that postgraduate degrees in education improve student outcomes. They increase teacher pay (according to union-negotiated pay scales), but don't help the students. [1] Those who work at least 35 hours/week.
  - impendia 15y ago
    I certainly don't propose completely eliminating accountability. I think we need to seriously rethink how and to whom teachers are accountable, and how they are evaluated.
  - tdfx 15y ago
    I wasn't implying that another 2-3 years of a graduate education degree would solve the problem at hand. Sorry I wasn't clear on that. My intended assertion is that the curriculum for an education degree should be the MOST challenging available, not a fallback for people who don't want to be bothered learning math and science.
mechanical_fish 15y ago
The best math teacher I ever had, an inspirational force who was a major reason I got through high school happy and successful, had an undergraduate degree in... something. Not sure it was math, actually. Definitely no education degree, though. Not even an undergraduate one. Poor guy couldn't even get an interview today. To see if you're a decent teacher today you must first incur enormous educational debts. Then you try teaching. Mindless credentialism is a terrible force.

by tdfx 15y ago

timjahn 15y ago

"so that they only work 9 months a year" Which, of course, they don't.

parasitius 15y ago
Exactly :) They work nine months their first year to hash out lesson plans and then repeat those plans thirty years till retirement
anamax 15y ago
> Which, of course, they don't. That's right - many of them have summer jobs.
- _delirium 15y ago
  In some places that's possible, but in many places it's pretty impractical. At the high school I attended, summer vacation is June 1 - August 22, but teacher in-service days are: June 2-10 (end of semester wrap-up), July 11-15 (make-up days for students who missed finals), and August 15-19 (pre-semester preparation), which leaves two discontiguous 4-week breaks.

pflats 15y ago

A number of states require postgraduate degrees (and then continuing education) for teachers in order to renew their teaching licenses.

mentat 15y ago

Then we'd definitely have enough quality teachers at the rate the jobs pay. And they'd have no student loan debt either. </sarcasm>

impendia 15y ago

Funny you suggest a track similar to law/med school. In those progressions graduates can expect to make well into the six figures. If we doubled teachers' pay, lightened their workload, and most importantly did not require teachers to answer so stringently to administrators (and voters and homebuyers) who mainly care about test scores, I would agree this is a good idea. I have a friend who's a teacher, who works hard, and who is picking up boring temp work for $10/hour almost every weekend so she can get out of town in December. That's just sad to me. I have heard from people who know that turnover in the classroom is already high, even among people who got a 1 year intensive master's degree in teaching. In principle, I'd like to set the bar higher as you suggest, but the first priority is to make teaching an attractive profession.

yummyfajitas 15y ago
How light a workload do teachers need? As it stands now, full time teachers [1] work only 38.5 hours/week (on average). http://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2008/03/art4full.pdf http://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2008/03/art4full.pdf I'm not sure how increasing pay, further reducing work hours, and completely eliminating accountability will do anything other than buy teacher's loyalties in an election year. Incidentally, there is also little evidence that postgraduate degrees in education improve student outcomes. They increase teacher pay (according to union-negotiated pay scales), but don't help the students. [1] Those who work at least 35 hours/week.
- impendia 15y ago
  I certainly don't propose completely eliminating accountability. I think we need to seriously rethink how and to whom teachers are accountable, and how they are evaluated.
- tdfx 15y ago
  I wasn't implying that another 2-3 years of a graduate education degree would solve the problem at hand. Sorry I wasn't clear on that. My intended assertion is that the curriculum for an education degree should be the MOST challenging available, not a fallback for people who don't want to be bothered learning math and science.

mechanical_fish 15y ago

The best math teacher I ever had, an inspirational force who was a major reason I got through high school happy and successful, had an undergraduate degree in... something. Not sure it was math, actually. Definitely no education degree, though. Not even an undergraduate one. Poor guy couldn't even get an interview today. To see if you're a decent teacher today you must first incur enormous educational debts. Then you try teaching. Mindless credentialism is a terrible force.