Steve Jobs runs his big mouth again...

[notyoueither]

AFAIK unions are a large part of the teaching profession all over the European world.

I think you have to look farther to find the short-comings of your system.

[MRT144]

why is it assumed that the sole reason for academic success or failure is dependent on teachers? why dont social factors, family factors, education systems, play a larger role in our minds. saying its teachers is scapegoating.

[Gatekeeper]

I thought holding educators accountable — up to and including the ability to get rid of errant educators, no matter how long they've been at a school — was one of the tenets of modern conservatives, Drake.

Did this one hit a little too close to home, in terms of your chosen profession?

Gatekeeper

[Gatekeeper]

Originally posted by Asher
It's interesting that the career of the guy on the left is on the rise, and the guy on the right is in decline.

Oh, for God's sake, Asher. If you're going to troll, at least put some damn effort into it.

Gatekeeper

[Kuciwalker]

Gatekeeper: note the thread icon.

[Gatekeeper]

Hmm. OK, that might be a problem. I've got 'Poly on "minimum interface" or whatever it is that reduces screen clutter.

Let me guess: The thread icon indicates that this is supposed to be a less-than-serious thread? In the meantime, lemme go adjust my settings ...

Gatekeeper

[Gatekeeper]

A-ha! That did the trick. I can now see icons with the "heavy" forum view selected. I shall now go eat a slice or two of delicious crow pie.

Gatekeeper

[Drake Tungsten]

And I'm sure as hell not planning on being a teacher...

[Colonâ„¢]

What forum view has big red warning signs flashing "THIS IS A TROLL" next to Drake's name?

[Kuciwalker]

I thought his name was the warning...

[Drake Tungsten]

I don't know what you guys are talking about. I'm not a troll...

[Jon Miller]

I know in some areas teachers are the highest class... Like people who are the best become teachers. In the US, it is generally the lowest group that become teachers, because pretty much everything else is higher status and pays more.

So instead of having your best and brightest become teachers, they become lawyers and businessmen and etc.

Best and brightest might not be needed to be teachers... but having the lowest parts of a class give most the teachers is a bad thing I think. Besides, culture is a big part of it as well, and we have groups in the US that place a low emphasis on educatoin.

Jon Miller
(I think that teachers have one of the lowest SAT scores of any program in college)

[Proteus_MST]

I also think that teychers should be paid by their performance and be able to be fired.
But how do you measure performance?

It seems to be difficult to me.
For example it might be normal for a well funded school in a middle to higher class district, that the pupils get good grades, and even bad teachers might get their pupils to pass (especially as their parents have enough money to hire private tutors to get their kids additional lessons for courses where their kids aren´t good).
For a school that is low on funds and lies in a run down district with high gang criminality however it might, even for good teachers, a hich archievement to even get all of the pupils to pass their tests.

Therefore grades seem to be a bad indicator for performance of teachers.

Judgement of pupils seems to be a bad indicator, too, as even teachers who aren´t very good at teaching might be popular among pupils.
Same goes for judgement by parents (who normally only see the marks their kids get and not what´s going on at school) or by other teachers (who could be inclined to judge the performance of other teachers as bad just because of rivalities (mobbing) even if these teachers performance in reality is good.

Even teasting the teachers might not be a good way to estimate their performance, as even teachers with only moderate knowledge about the subject they´re teachiung might be very good in teaching their pupils about the stuff they know (whereas on the other hand teachers who know almost everything about the subject they teach, might be very bad to transform the teach the subject in a way that their pupils do understand it)

So IMHO it might be difficult to really objectively measure the performance of teachers.

[Barnabas]

I think Finland solved this by making it pretty hard to become a teacher in first place

[Q Classic]

Originally posted by Drake Tungsten
I don't know what you guys are talking about. I'm not a troll...

Bet you're one of them Blood Elves, huh?

Wow, I just made a WoW joke. I will go hang my head in shame now.