Ahh the French

[Elok]

1. If you want to teach students to love the national cuisine, a school cafeteria's a lousy place to start.
2. I find it hard to believe that there's no way to determine a teacher's merit.

[Dinner]

1. I agree but since everyone has to eat (or go home) at the cafeteria they do have a captive audience plus the government is already paying for it so it's an easy place for politicians to demagog.

2. I agree there has to be some way but the hard part is isolating all the other factors and doing it in a reproducibly way. I could have the best teacher in the world teaching in the ghetto and his result are likely to still be below those of a extremely mediocre teacher in a lily white upper class neighborhood where parents all went to college and so pressure their kids to achieve in college prep classes. Is the Teacher what's better or is it because wealthy parents hire tutors to give their little pothead an extra edge? What if one of the ghetto kids really wants to succeed but his school is crap, his mom is a crackhead on welfare, and his brother just got shot in a drive by? How do you isolate all of those other factors and accurately assign how much of it is due to the teacher?

Let's assume we do come up with a way to do this. Teachers now get paid due to their mysterious "skill" I'd be willing to bet teachers will want to go to the best schools and avoid the worst simply because that could give them the edge in getting the bonus "skill" pay; do we really want a system where the best teachers have EVEN MORE incentive to avoid disadvantaged schools? I went to good schools, I make enough money that my theoretical kids will end up going to one of the nice schools so it really doesn't impact my life, but this doesn't seem like a good way to improve the system as a whole especially for the kids in bad schools.

[Berzerker]

but...but...tomatoes are good for ya

[Ben Kenobi]

I mean how the students perform in subsequent years). For example, when I was in college I worked in a program to tutor pre-college students (3rd through 12th grade) - some tutors' "charges" consistently improved, some didn't; some tutors had complaints lodged against them for being *******s, some didn't.

It's not that difficult to evaluate the teacher if you have the student's grades from the year before.

Look, OB, if you've got BK, LOIN and HC all in agreement against you, that's a pretty reliable way to show that you are incorrect.

[Ben Kenobi]

How much of a factor do you think a teacher plays in test scores and how do you find that out.

Over a sample of say 20 kids, what is the one factor that they have in common?

[Fake Boris]

Look, OB, if you've got BK, LOIN and HC all in agreement against you, that's a pretty reliable way to show that you are incorrect.

I'm still waiting for an answer to my further posts.

[DaShi]

Why? It's just going to be nonsense.

[Fake Boris]

1. If you want to teach students to love the national cuisine, a school cafeteria's a lousy place to start.

As I said, cafeterias are *much* better in France than anywhere else I've seen.
This said, I think the idea is basic food education, not really serving Michelin starred cuisine in schools.

2. I find it hard to believe that there's no way to determine a teacher's merit.

There are probably ways. Neither the current governments or school administrators can be trusted to implement them.

[onodera]

Look, OB, if you've got BK, LOIN and HC all in agreement against you, that's a pretty reliable way to show that you are absolutely correct.

Fixed that for you.

[kentonio]

I disagree with Boris completely. Kids grow up loving sweets but as they become adults their tastes become more complex and they open up to other foods. Kids like simpler, sweet tastes and adults prefer other things, it's what happens when you grow up.

Try looking at what crap they put into school meals. Also if you raise kids eating ****, the perform far worse in school, often develop obesity problems and grow up unlikely to eat good food. Schools have been poisoning generations of kids with **** that no self respecting parent should let their kids within 100 miles of.

[Kidlicious]

Adults prefer sweets too, but the smart ones don't eat like children. We shouldn't feed our children crap, because it teaches them wrong.

[Az]

Ah yes, the French, a notoriously idiotic nation, not supporting junk food.
Food Nazis, indeed, yet they like the McDs!


Holy ****, shut the **** up.
There is nothing wrong about banning **** food in school cafeterias, of all places. The fact that many of the french do eat McDonalds and enjoy it just means that they are human, duh. Nobody denies that McDonald's and other junk food is attractive. What I do deny is that it is good for you, and you have to have the "right" to be exposed to it, especially as an adolescent in school premises.

The food Nazis took my freedom to get disgustingly fat!
QQ

Much like with drugs, and liquor - **** food should be legalized, taxed, and regulated.

[Egbert]

Hrm? No. It's not that difficult to evaluate the teacher if you have the student's grades from the year before.

If I was a teacher, I would give everybody top marks for everything. The following year, I would be considered a perfect teacher. All my students received perfect marks so that makes me the perfect teacher. Right?

[Az]

What's with the French hate, Americans? just so that you know, the french are:
a) the most awesome country in Europe.
b) the closest to the US, in multiple things.

[Kidlicious]

If I was a teacher, I would give everybody top marks for everything. The following year, I would be considered a perfect teacher. All my students received perfect marks so that makes me the perfect teacher. Right?

Especially if the teacher before you graded properly, but I don't think any do.

(I taught high school for one year and quit.)