If the best teachers in the country all taught at the worst underperforming ghetto school- would the students excel? (middle school, salary)

[loves2read]

what most people in the world outside education don't want to recognize is that a teacher has only part of the +/- imput into a child's educational progress
home, family, administration, outside factors---they ALL can be more or less responsible for what happens to educate an individual...
some students can come from really negative home situations and for some reason have a spark that won't be denied--with just limited nurturing, they can succeed against odds that would defeat people with better support systems...

a teacher can make an impact but a teacher is not the only impact--and in today's fragmented society, parents are so often the weak link because they demand so much and supply so little...from creation to graduation...
in my state there is on way to rate parents on what they contribute to the education process although schools and teachers are rated and those results are published for all to see--although teachers are not indicated individually on those scorings--their individual performance evaluation from their principal takes into account their students' success/failure on standardized testing and goes toward their rating each year...
the fact that so many children in today's American come to school hungry and with physical/emotional issues that wear away at their educational situation is just a sign that America has chosen NOT to subsidize factors that can be detrimental to education...
by not having a logical and accurate information system about preventing pregnancy among teens we see people who are not prepared physically, emotionally, financially to be parents and who struggle for YEARS after the birth of these babies to be self-supporting, successful individuals
and yet teen pregnancies are soaring in so many states--and children from those parents are at risk almost ALL their lives because of this beginning---
and people still don't want to take steps to support birth control for BOTH sexes and prefer to preach abstinance---short sighted and definitely not realistic about the problem...

[antitravolta]

I've previously been a teacher (out of work because of budget cuts) and worked this last year as a tutor. It really opened my eyes. After a couple months of tutoring, I could really see students making huge improvements. They get that spark of excitement in learning where you can really see their potential. However, when I look up from where I'm tutoring the kids, I see the mom sitting there watching Sponge Bob for hours, smoking and pregnant. I know at that point that there are limits to what I can accomplish because I get contracted to tutor each student for 14 hours. Once that time's up, the family will go right back to doing nothing to help their student learn and whatever good we accomplished will disappear over a matter of weeks or months. It really does begin at home. I have reason to believe I'm a pretty darn good teacher, but really, if I'm teaching I get them for 45 minutes a day and the parents get them from 4:00 until they go to bed. When I was tutoring, I was thinking how much more productive it would be if I tutored the parents on how to help their kids with their homework.

[flik_becky]

Originally Posted by TT Dave

I know several public school teachers and almost all of them have mentioned that bad parents play a big factor in whether a student will excel in school or not. Bad parents can wipe out many gains made by good teachers very quickly.

Ok, I had to comment on this. I don't think it is so much about "bad" parents. I think it has to do with their experiences with school as they grew up or even years of bad experiences for their child. Then you throw in a great teacher who wants to make a difference and the parent is just like, "Yeah for the OTHER kids. Show me and then I'll believe it." With that attitude, it becomes harder, especially if its the attitude the child sees everyday at home.

For pre-k-k, I think that a good teacher is one who initiates lots of contact with all the parents. I would be sending out personalized emails often, always making sure that I am praising even the worst students acievements. I would find a way to really bring the parents into it and stay connected with it. If this is the impression the parents get early on, this is a strong foundation for the future school years.

Parents often do not know what their role is. Its pretty hands off if you go by the first day care standards, "Make it easier on your child, drop them off and immediantly leave. Don't linger." If parents were allowed to drop in when they wanted and be more hands on with what was going on day by day, then they would move forward and do this with school work. My children for example, never have been in day care, preschool, ect (except three torturous weeks for our DD at 1 1/2) and I have always been part of their learning. If we had chose to put our children in school, we'd be arrving at the school room to pick up our children just to be able to say hi to the teacher and ask about homework and individual struggles and successes for the day so we could immediantly address them and make sure they stay on the right track. We homeschool though, but if our children ever have to go to school, that's exactly what I would do...because I have always been very hands on.

Some "bad" parents are just single parents working their butts off to keep their home and do not have the time to be the worlds greatest parents and the kids go home and do their homework in a house with only an older sibling to make sure they get it done. A GOOD teacher is one that recognizes these challenges for the student and offers more to make sure the child gets what they need.

"Bad" parents are the one's with the kids who are pulling down Susy's pants and come to the school to scream at you because they don't believe their kid did anything wrong.

[roots'nbulbs]

Some of the best money this country ever spent was on the Head Start program.

When it is implemented well, it probably has helped as much as anything---before a teacher (who is about learning subject matter) is charged with the ravages of poverty and disfunction and lack of moral teachings.

[linywiny]

WOW... you think because someone is poor or in a certain demographic area they are broken?The middle class & wealthy have just as many broken homes and families it just gets covered up.When you have money you can pay your way out of the court systems or donate money to the schools you want your child to excel at,pay for tutors so your athlete makes the grade they need to get that scholarship. Poor people don't have that luxury. Poor and "Broken" as you put it are two totally different problems.Poor families are probably less broken because all they have are each other. People that are writing in this thread automatically think that a certain type of person from a certain demographic raise their children different, that is just crazy. What in God's name would possess you to say"IQ is sort of a forbidden topic,but a lot of the ghetto kids don't have a lot of it,that and they are not interested in higher education as such" Get your head out of the sand! No wonder there are so many messed up kids in our country.

[Bayesian]

Originally Posted by linywiny

WOW... you think because someone is poor or in a certain demographic area they are broken?The middle class & wealthy have just as many broken homes and families it just gets covered up.When you have money you can pay your way out of the court systems or donate money to the schools you want your child to excel at,pay for tutors so your athlete makes the grade they need to get that scholarship. Poor people don't have that luxury. Poor and "Broken" as you put it are two totally different problems.Poor families are probably less broken because all they have are each other. People that are writing in this thread automatically think that a certain type of person from a certain demographic raise their children different, that is just crazy. What in God's name would possess you to say"IQ is sort of a forbidden topic,but a lot of the ghetto kids don't have a lot of it,that and they are not interested in higher education as such" Get your head out of the sand! No wonder there are so many messed up kids in our country.

You need to be intelligent and hard working to excel academically. Actually, being genuinely interested in your study is more important than hard work. You'll naturally spend more time on your interests.

Affirmative Action doesn't work for a reason. I think everybody knows what it is, I don't bother to bring it up.

[tnff]

This a really old thread, but since it's already been resuscitated, I might was well put in my nickel. Would putting the best teachers into the worst schools make a difference? Well once upon a time I might have believed that. But after becoming involved in youth programs, I seriously doubt it. What I've seen is the kids who have parents that are hard working, who have a drive to succeed, the kids also have a drive to succeed. The kids whose parents don't, well the kids don't either. To make it worse, those parents drag their kids down with them, frankly often don't want their kids to do better than they did whereas success oriented parents what their kids to do more.


On the other hand, what if we put the worst teachers in the best schools? Ignoring the fact the parents wouldn't stand for it, performance would go down. While the kids would still be motivated, they wouldn't be pushed to their potential. Which is kind of what our current school policies do -- pull down the best performing kids.


Someone up thread mentioned a "revolution" to equalize socio economic factors and so forth. Even if you did that, unless you constantly put in some outside forcing function (communist Russia for example) it wouldn't take long until that "equalized" society started naturally separating into those with drive and those without.

[Old Gringo]

Nope.

Every school performs as well as the demographic it serves.

[AMSS]

NOOOOOOO!!!

I have one kid who just graduated a low performing school. He's off to college at the end of August and I cannot speak highly enough of the teachers at his high school. Were there a few subpar ones? Absolutely - but I've seen the same if not more in suburban schools. Those kids who capitalize on the education offered do very well; but many don't due to so many factors that have nothing to do with the teachers or the schools.

[dazzleman]

Originally Posted by Weekend Traveler

If the hundred best teachers in the country were assigned to teach at the worst school in America would there really be that much change?

I doubt it.