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A public school around here did it about 30 years ago beginning with a particular 1st grade class. Years on this school cranks out ~70/75 NMSFs per year.
I reject your last comment. It's roughly as absurd as most of your claims. We rank 31 out of 35 in great part because we have legions of terrible teachers who are clock watching functionaries and many parents who either don't care or want to shield little Jimmy and little Jane from any level of academic expectation. Further, the three meals at school plan limits the amount of time kids spend around lame parents and gets them fed.
Heck around here Dallas ISD which was on 100% life support a few years ago has made incredible progress by paying great teachers more than mediocre teachers this has also driven many poor teachers to leave. It's a win, win, win.
I agree that high stakes testing is bad, but that's not the cause of the problem. High stakes testing, common core, etc are all bad attempts at solutions that avoid having to dig down to the politically incorrect conclusion that is much of the problem.
In no particular order.
a. Lack of give a damn among parents and students. Agree
b. Too many education dollars spent on overhead and misc staff rather than on teachers. In some school systems that may be true. It was not true in the system I spent most of my career. I did see it in another school system I worked in earlier in my career.
c. Too much emphasis on various psychologies and strategies rather than subject matter knowledge. You can't teach what you don't know. If you don't know how to work with facts, facts are of little value.
d. Too much focus on an "everyone must go to college" path rather than providing diverse paths that provide the best outcomes for everyone. Agreed.
f. Too much effort to use the school system to solve social issues.
True, but that is up to local elected school boards to decide. But a bigger problem today is allowing schools to succumb to the culture wars between liberals and conservatives.
As long as you recognize just how tremendously you'd need to up teacher pay to have a prayer of attracting the top quarter of graduates with subject matter expertise to forsake more lucrative options to go that route...and have a good revenue stream to make that happen.
Yes. It really is a question of supply versus demand.
That's how I educated myself, by dwelling in libraries, studying subjects in depth, that were never even discussed in the uninspiring mediocrity of classroom curricula. I excelled with our annual, comprehensive achievement tests, but didn't do so well with classroom grades, as I ignored most of what they taught there and put on their quizzes and end-of-term tests. There's no penalty for forgetting everything you learned in the classrooms, once you've taken the semester tests. But the comprehensive tests require that you hold what you've learned in long-term memory and that you know how to put the knowledge to work in solving complex problems.
It's impossible for us to determine how well that turned out. And the question is not how it turned out for one student, but how it would turn out for millions of students.
I actually see this idea as aligning more with Libertarian values than Democrat. Yes, the whole cost thing is an issue in and of itself. The very nature of the question in the thread's title suggests the libraries would replace schools, not just add on to our existing obligations.
But the self-paced curriculum is strongly an "every man for himself" approach. Yes, there will be glaring holes in certain subjects based on a child's interest and parents' capabilities to assist and explain, but isn't that the case today with public, and even some good private schools?
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It's probably been said a million times: Leave the teachers alone. Let them teach. There are really no "new" strategies and tricks to teaching. A good teacher looks at each kid as an individual and tries to teach them in their own way. Teachers do not need more gimmicks and silly tricks to teach them how to teach. Just save your money and LET THEM TEACH.
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Let me ask you a question about that.
Thinking back to your elementary, middle/junior high, high school years, (to keep it simple), how would you grade your teachers.
What percent were "A teachers"? "B teachers", "C teachers", "D teachers", "F teachers"?
Uh-oh, how dare you challenge a highly unionized, bureaucratic and administratively burdened system that seems to follow the political wind rather than the true tests of a student's skill and needs. Should a system that seems to emphasize presenting material rather actually teach it trouble shooting student difficulties along the way.
1. About 70% of teachers are "unionized", although many of those are in organizations that are not actually unions.
2. Virtually all large organizations become bureaucratic.
3. What could be more political than local school districts? And who in this nation is using schools for winning the culture wars?
4. Are all these things you see as negative the fault of the schools, or the fault of the society?
1. About 70% of teachers are "unionized", although many of those are in organizations that are not actually unions.
2. Virtually all large organizations become bureaucratic.
3. What could be more political than local school districts? And who in this nation is using schools for winning the culture wars?
4. Are all these things you see as negative the fault of the schools, or the fault of the society?
In what state? In my state, it is precisely 0%. Public employees are not allowed to unionize. Professional associations and unrecognized orgs do not count, and have never counted - they have no contracts, thus they have no teeth.
Something like a supersized Teach for America would help. Go to recent grads with excellent marks and lay out the proposition teach and any we'll pay you X and we'll pay down Y amount of student loans to boot.
Hit up older professionals and mid-career people looking for new gig.
1. My son's high school physics teacher was a retired oil and gas geophysicist. He was great.
2. My son's first really excellent math teacher was a mid-career engineer who wanted to detune her career for a few years for her kid's sake. She had a profound positive impact on my son.
3. My daughter's high school biology teacher was a later career MD.
_________
Finland, Sweden, Norway and others recruit top notch college grads. to become teachers and they tend to be paid less to a lot less than US teachers. And as a group they are much better teachers with better to much better outcomes.
_________
It's not that US teachers are bums and slackers. The system rewards the wrong people over time that simple fact damages education.
1. The quality of private schools is pretty much just as hit and miss and public schools...and with less data to support their claims of quality.
2. You think not paying professionals beans is a good thing that is likely to attract the best talent?
3. A few of the "mid-career" people you described we hired. A few were good. More didn't work out at all.
4. Considering that most mid-career people earn more than teachers, it's not likely many will want to move into teaching. We had such applicants. And usually when they heard where they'd be on salary scale they turned down offers.
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