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On October 10 2012 03:35 NeMeSiS3 wrote:Show nested quote +On October 10 2012 03:32 dvorakftw wrote:On October 10 2012 02:56 NeMeSiS3 wrote:
Feeds the idiots whatever they want to hear. Who are the "idiots" you refer to? Anyone who goes "Romney supports this!" "Romney will cut 5Trillion because he said so!" "Romney will support abortion!" No one knows what Romney will do because he flips more than a fish out of water. He's a man who says "The sky isn't falling" to those who believe it and "The sky is falling" to those who want to hear that. Whatever his opinions really are he's a coward who only voices the ones people want to hear.
Such exaggeration...holy shit. You are pretty naive to think anyone would ever have this much support as a presidential candidate if that was really true. Such a weak claim to say that he only voices opinions that people want to hear, especially considering when Obama does it his stance is just "evolving".
President Obama indicated support for gay marriage in a questionnaire as a state senate candidate in Illinois but has opposed it since his 2004 US Senate campaign. As public support for gay marriage increases and the Democratic base’s demands grow more insistent, the President has acknowledged their concerns, stating last year that his views were “evolving” and that he “struggle[s]” with the issue.
http://www.cjr.org/swing_states_project/obama_evolves_romney_flip-flop.php?page=all
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On October 10 2012 05:31 ZeaL. wrote:
I'm pretty liberal on a number of things but I'm not "liberal" when it comes to education. It would be nice to see some support of these ideas from Obama...
1) Pay teachers by performance. I think unions can be useful, in this case teachers unions have really fucked our students. It doesn't make sense to have teachers pay be dictated by seniority. It really pained me, as a student of the public school system, to see young bright teachers come in and do a great job teaching while they got paid less than half of what some old fogey was getting paid for doing a terrible job. The bright ones leave when they realize that it will bet least 15-20 years before they get paid what they're worth leaving only terrible or old teachers.
2) Pay teachers more. I hate the term, if you can't do, teach. There are so many who can do quite well but can't teach for shit. Teaching is an incredibly difficult (and important job) to do well and the amount of money we pay (good) teachers is just not enough to attract the kind of intellect required for a good education system. We pay so much per student in the US yet still get such poor outcomes, there are definitely places where funding can be cut to pay for better teachers.
3) My mother is an accounting supervisor for a school district in CA. The one thing that is absolutely absurd with draining money is taking care of mentally retarded kids. One ridiculous example, a mom has this kind with autism and this kid basically can't interact with anyone because he has gotten violent with other kids in the past. The district's solution is to send him to a special school in Florida where he is taken care of 1 on 1. The cost is astronomical, ~20k a month. For ONE kid. There is no single criminal in this situation, its just that the system is fucked up. The mom can't stay home to take care of the kid and earn an income, the school is legally obligated to the kids care during school hours, and the kid can't be at a normal school. Of course this is just one example but the system is fucked. Kids who have no business being in special ed get thrown in when they shouldn't be and kids who will never learn anything are given a dumbed down version of the normal curriculum, as if that will help them in life. I have no solutions here, the problems are myriad and manifold, but someone needs to at least acknowledge that special ed needs a ton of work.
4) Stop treating everyone the same. Seriously. Not everyone needs to go to college. That doesn't mean you don't need to be educated but that there are many technical jobs that pay well and are needed in our society. We can learn about how to do this from countries in Europe. In Switzerland for example, people can choose whether or not they wish to continue an academic career to college or enter a vocational school after which they are linked up with local businesses. The obsession in the US with delaying making any sort of career choice until the last second really hurts most people as they're forced to learn stuff that they don't care about, won't use, and isn't helpful to them in gaining employment. For those who are aiming to be well educated in general, this system works okay but classes are pulled down by those who don't care, harming both types of students. A number of experimental vocational schools have popped up but its in no way a common thing yet.
The difference on #1 is how do you measure their performance. Most of the time it's based on test scores, and lets be honest that is really unfair to the teachers. Think back to when you went to school and just imagine some of your classes, some of your classes were filled with a ton of super bright attentive students who put forth their best effort, and some were filled with kids who just dicked around and didn't give a shit, look to your fourth paragraph where you say these students pull you down. This is completely random (other than the fact the more remedial classes will have a higher concentration of the second). So tell me then, how we are supposed to evaluate performance. Teachers are already evaluated by their principal and their peers on their actual teaching methods etc. They might not be paid according to the results though.
I agree teachers should be paid more, but nothing too outrageous(I don't know what the magic number is but it's more than it is now)because we can't forget the kids need school supplies etc, we need the budget to help the teachers, but also remember the schools need to run. It really comes down to how much schools cost to run, and how much we are giving them, and I think there are some areas in this that really need improving. I have never seen the accounting books, so maybe you can give us a better picture for where the hell the money goes.
The problem with special ed in a lot of places is that they are held to the same standards on tests that other students are at least for No Child Left Behind was concerned when I was in school, my high school in particular several years ago, because test scores = money, trying to get rid of students and put them in other places, despite the costs too others, might actually be a legitimate strategy, I don't know. I also don't know if Race to the Top holds special ed students to the same standards NCLB did or does would need to do research.
I completely one hundred percent agree that college is not for everyone, and it really sucks for a lot of peoples bank accounts and lives that they have to go through a year or two or three to find that out. I think quicker paths to careers would be great, I wish that the system worked where you applied for a job or field you really wanted after maybe 2 year(FREE) college where you take all sorts of core classes + a special focus on what your interested in, then you showed your willingness to learn the appropriate skills etc in the interviews for the job/field then you go to work for them as an apprentice with a decent wage and your company supplies you with the proper training, additional classes/schooling etc that you need to work the trade, after completing the training etc then you get paid big time!(not discarded for more apprentices, they invested in you by paying for this training, schooling, so they have a reason to give you good benefits and stick around, if they pay for it, it's really hard to lose you to another company, so more competition). For instance my grandfather worked as an engineer for Raytheon, and they sent him back to school fully paid for to get his masters(he had a four year) because they liked him and his work and wanted him to do more than he was doing for them.
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Cayman Islands24199 Posts
i suspect that a part of the logic of scoring reports is really to give parents more information about the 'ranking' of schools. in other words, more information to self selection. it will accelerate the process of rich parents sending kids to higher ranking schools and so forth.
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BlueBird, you are a gentleman and a scholar. I hope my endorsement doesn't damn you in the eyes of our peanut gallery 
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On October 10 2012 05:26 Deathmanbob wrote:
I wonder if Xdaunt is happy, but RCP now has romney ahead in national polls by .7. While i still think it has a lot to do with post debate bump there is no denying that this race is VERY VERY close and i romney now has a good chance of winning if he next three debates are anything like the first
Pew Research has a new poll out showing Romney +4 among likely voters. This has been getting a lot of press today since the same pollster showed Obama +8 before the debates.
The crosstabs show 36% Republicans, 33% Democrats. Remember, in the wave year of 2010, the partisan identification was 36% each.
Where are the poll unskew-ers now?
For the record, I maintain my view that partisan identification is a measured attitude -- not something that pollsters should be doing any reweighting upon. The first debate performance may be causing more conservatives to claim the Republican label and pushing center-left types to call themselves Independent. Basically the opposite of what was happening after the party conventions, when the Democrats had the momentum.
It's just amusing to hear all these voices for partisan reweighting fall silent once that highly dynamic variable starts leaning in their favor.
In fairness, RCP's Sean Trende has been saying this even before the whole "Unskewed Polls" thing took off.
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2012/08/01/cbsnytquinnipiac_swing_state_polls__party_id.html
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On October 10 2012 06:02 Signet wrote:Show nested quote +On October 10 2012 05:26 Deathmanbob wrote:
I wonder if Xdaunt is happy, but RCP now has romney ahead in national polls by .7. While i still think it has a lot to do with post debate bump there is no denying that this race is VERY VERY close and i romney now has a good chance of winning if he next three debates are anything like the first Pew Research has a new poll out showing Romney +4 among likely voters. This has been getting a lot of press today since the same pollster showed Obama +8 before the debates. The crosstabs show 36% Republicans, 33% Democrats. Remember, in the wave year of 2010, the partisan identification was 36% each. Where are the poll unskew-ers now? For the record, I maintain my view that partisan identification is a measured attitude -- not something that pollsters should be doing any reweighting upon. The first debate performance may be causing more conservatives to claim the Republican label and pushing center-left types to call themselves Independent. Basically the opposite of what was happening after the party conventions, when the Democrats had the momentum. It's just amusing to hear all these voices for partisan reweighting fall silent once that highly dynamic variable starts leaning in their favor. In fairness, RCP's Sean Trende has been saying this even before the whole "Unskewed Polls" thing took off. http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2012/08/01/cbsnytquinnipiac_swing_state_polls__party_id.html
It is kind of funny, I bet those same people who were saying Romney is done, its a blow-out, because of polling data are probably playing down the data now and saying it doesn't mean that much.
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Frankly there are to many bad teachers. They need to either raise the qualifications of teachers or allow teachers to be fired relatively easier, it was exhausting going through high school with teachers that were simply awful... One teacher teacher teaching PDA to us talked about how disgusting sex was and that we should never have it except for marriage... Another taught me the > < signs wrong, 5 < 3 etc -.- Then I had a gym teacher who was obese and got us to run half a mile every two months and the rest was ... well nothing actually we just kinda played with basketballs.
Anyway there are more, teachers simply need higher qualifications or bad teachers deserve to be fired on that premise alone.
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On October 10 2012 05:58 sam!zdat wrote:BlueBird, you are a gentleman and a scholar. I hope my endorsement doesn't damn you in the eyes of our peanut gallery
That's funny, his writing style is like the inverse of yours. You make one or two line quips that are often nebulous and then he busts out with the essays.
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On October 10 2012 06:12 jdseemoreglass wrote:Show nested quote +On October 10 2012 05:58 sam!zdat wrote:BlueBird, you are a gentleman and a scholar. I hope my endorsement doesn't damn you in the eyes of our peanut gallery That's funny, his writing style is like the inverse of yours. You make one or two line quips that are often nebulous and then he busts out with the essays.
LOL
Yeah, if I were grading this thread I would give him an A and me an F
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Teachers should absolutely never be paid according to test performance. Every instance of this is riddled with disasters, teachers cheating for students, bad students being expelled to a different school in march because the annual test is in april, and then the standard problem of not all classes being equal, and teachers having no real control over the quality of pupils they get.
Education needs a ton of help in the USA, but blaming the teachers is absurd.
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On October 10 2012 05:55 BlueBird. wrote:Show nested quote +On October 10 2012 05:31 ZeaL. wrote:
I'm pretty liberal on a number of things but I'm not "liberal" when it comes to education. It would be nice to see some support of these ideas from Obama...
1) Pay teachers by performance. I think unions can be useful, in this case teachers unions have really fucked our students. It doesn't make sense to have teachers pay be dictated by seniority. It really pained me, as a student of the public school system, to see young bright teachers come in and do a great job teaching while they got paid less than half of what some old fogey was getting paid for doing a terrible job. The bright ones leave when they realize that it will bet least 15-20 years before they get paid what they're worth leaving only terrible or old teachers.
2) Pay teachers more. I hate the term, if you can't do, teach. There are so many who can do quite well but can't teach for shit. Teaching is an incredibly difficult (and important job) to do well and the amount of money we pay (good) teachers is just not enough to attract the kind of intellect required for a good education system. We pay so much per student in the US yet still get such poor outcomes, there are definitely places where funding can be cut to pay for better teachers.
3) My mother is an accounting supervisor for a school district in CA. The one thing that is absolutely absurd with draining money is taking care of mentally retarded kids. One ridiculous example, a mom has this kind with autism and this kid basically can't interact with anyone because he has gotten violent with other kids in the past. The district's solution is to send him to a special school in Florida where he is taken care of 1 on 1. The cost is astronomical, ~20k a month. For ONE kid. There is no single criminal in this situation, its just that the system is fucked up. The mom can't stay home to take care of the kid and earn an income, the school is legally obligated to the kids care during school hours, and the kid can't be at a normal school. Of course this is just one example but the system is fucked. Kids who have no business being in special ed get thrown in when they shouldn't be and kids who will never learn anything are given a dumbed down version of the normal curriculum, as if that will help them in life. I have no solutions here, the problems are myriad and manifold, but someone needs to at least acknowledge that special ed needs a ton of work.
4) Stop treating everyone the same. Seriously. Not everyone needs to go to college. That doesn't mean you don't need to be educated but that there are many technical jobs that pay well and are needed in our society. We can learn about how to do this from countries in Europe. In Switzerland for example, people can choose whether or not they wish to continue an academic career to college or enter a vocational school after which they are linked up with local businesses. The obsession in the US with delaying making any sort of career choice until the last second really hurts most people as they're forced to learn stuff that they don't care about, won't use, and isn't helpful to them in gaining employment. For those who are aiming to be well educated in general, this system works okay but classes are pulled down by those who don't care, harming both types of students. A number of experimental vocational schools have popped up but its in no way a common thing yet.
The difference on #1 is how do you measure their performance. Most of the time it's based on test scores, and lets be honest that is really unfair to the teachers. Think back to when you went to school and just imagine some of your classes, some of your classes were filled with a ton of super bright attentive students who put forth their best effort, and some were filled with kids who just dicked around and didn't give a shit, look to your fourth paragraph where you say these students pull you down. This is completely random (other than the fact the more remedial classes will have a higher concentration of the second). So tell me then, how we are supposed to evaluate performance. Teachers are already evaluated by their principal and their peers on their actual teaching methods etc. They might not be paid according to the results though.
I imagined that instead of rating performance based on class performance in a vacuum, that teachers would be graded by comparing their students' results on a year to year basis. That is, if a teacher got above average students in his/her class one year and below average students the next that would make almost no difference at all. For example if a student was below average in a year, but you as a teacher improved their score more than the teacher who previously had that student, that kind of data can show a difference in teaching ability when the sample size is increased and across time.
I agree it would be dumb to say your class average this year is lower, so you obviously taught worse. But why would anyone use that method instead of always comparing the student growth to his/her previous numbers?
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On October 10 2012 06:13 sam!zdat wrote:Show nested quote +On October 10 2012 06:12 jdseemoreglass wrote:On October 10 2012 05:58 sam!zdat wrote:BlueBird, you are a gentleman and a scholar. I hope my endorsement doesn't damn you in the eyes of our peanut gallery That's funny, his writing style is like the inverse of yours. You make one or two line quips that are often nebulous and then he busts out with the essays. LOL Yeah, if I were grading this thread I would give him an A and me an F
Nah, it's the quality of thought that matters, not the delivery, and you are both well above average. Now my endorsement is the one that will plague you. 
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On October 10 2012 06:15 Trumpet wrote:
Teachers should absolutely never be paid according to test performance. Every instance of this is riddled with disasters, teachers cheating for students, bad students being expelled to a different school in march because the annual test is in april, and then the standard problem of not all classes being equal, and teachers having no real control over the quality of pupils they get.
Education needs a ton of help in the USA, but blaming the teachers is absurd.
I would argue that teaching practice in North America have declined (Canada included) and frankly I see a correlation between bad teachers and the society.
It is no wonder that North America is drastically falling behind places like China, not only do our students not want to learn and advocate being bums but our teachers are frankly sub par on average. I can only name 3-4 teachers that had a lasting effect on my life, that actually taught me and were more use than a textbook or youtube video. The rest? The other 50+ ? Nothing, maybe a few tid bits here and there but nothing I couldn't have gotten to myself in less time.
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But what are "results"?
I don't think you can evaluate teachers on anything other than a qualitative basis.
On October 10 2012 06:18 jdseemoreglass wrote:Show nested quote +On October 10 2012 06:13 sam!zdat wrote:On October 10 2012 06:12 jdseemoreglass wrote:On October 10 2012 05:58 sam!zdat wrote:BlueBird, you are a gentleman and a scholar. I hope my endorsement doesn't damn you in the eyes of our peanut gallery That's funny, his writing style is like the inverse of yours. You make one or two line quips that are often nebulous and then he busts out with the essays. LOL Yeah, if I were grading this thread I would give him an A and me an F Nah, it's the quality of thought that matters, not the delivery, and you are both well above average. Now my endorsement is the one that will plague you.
Oh god it burns! Quick let me say something totalitarian and you can take it back!
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On October 10 2012 06:09 kmillz wrote:
It is kind of funny, I bet those same people who were saying Romney is done, its a blow-out, because of polling data are probably playing down the data now and saying it doesn't mean that much.
Yes, inconsistency runs deep on both sides.
I look forward to some left leaning blogger launching his own poll reweighting website and receiving national press on MSNBC
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On October 10 2012 06:19 sam!zdat wrote:
But what are "results"?
I don't think you can evaluate teachers on anything other than a qualitative basis.
People need to keep in mind that it is not simply the teachers that need to be evaluated, it is the administrative system that surrounds them that has the problems and the inefficiencies.
As far as how to measure performance, my solution is very simple. Leave it up to the parents. They know better than any bureaucrat what a good school or teacher looks like. Give them the money, don't send it to failing schools to reward their failure.
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On October 10 2012 05:55 BlueBird. wrote:Show nested quote +On October 10 2012 05:31 ZeaL. wrote:
I'm pretty liberal on a number of things but I'm not "liberal" when it comes to education. It would be nice to see some support of these ideas from Obama...
1) Pay teachers by performance. I think unions can be useful, in this case teachers unions have really fucked our students. It doesn't make sense to have teachers pay be dictated by seniority. It really pained me, as a student of the public school system, to see young bright teachers come in and do a great job teaching while they got paid less than half of what some old fogey was getting paid for doing a terrible job. The bright ones leave when they realize that it will bet least 15-20 years before they get paid what they're worth leaving only terrible or old teachers.
2) Pay teachers more. I hate the term, if you can't do, teach. There are so many who can do quite well but can't teach for shit. Teaching is an incredibly difficult (and important job) to do well and the amount of money we pay (good) teachers is just not enough to attract the kind of intellect required for a good education system. We pay so much per student in the US yet still get such poor outcomes, there are definitely places where funding can be cut to pay for better teachers.
3) My mother is an accounting supervisor for a school district in CA. The one thing that is absolutely absurd with draining money is taking care of mentally retarded kids. One ridiculous example, a mom has this kind with autism and this kid basically can't interact with anyone because he has gotten violent with other kids in the past. The district's solution is to send him to a special school in Florida where he is taken care of 1 on 1. The cost is astronomical, ~20k a month. For ONE kid. There is no single criminal in this situation, its just that the system is fucked up. The mom can't stay home to take care of the kid and earn an income, the school is legally obligated to the kids care during school hours, and the kid can't be at a normal school. Of course this is just one example but the system is fucked. Kids who have no business being in special ed get thrown in when they shouldn't be and kids who will never learn anything are given a dumbed down version of the normal curriculum, as if that will help them in life. I have no solutions here, the problems are myriad and manifold, but someone needs to at least acknowledge that special ed needs a ton of work.
4) Stop treating everyone the same. Seriously. Not everyone needs to go to college. That doesn't mean you don't need to be educated but that there are many technical jobs that pay well and are needed in our society. We can learn about how to do this from countries in Europe. In Switzerland for example, people can choose whether or not they wish to continue an academic career to college or enter a vocational school after which they are linked up with local businesses. The obsession in the US with delaying making any sort of career choice until the last second really hurts most people as they're forced to learn stuff that they don't care about, won't use, and isn't helpful to them in gaining employment. For those who are aiming to be well educated in general, this system works okay but classes are pulled down by those who don't care, harming both types of students. A number of experimental vocational schools have popped up but its in no way a common thing yet.
The difference on #1 is how do you measure their performance. Most of the time it's based on test scores, and lets be honest that is really unfair to the teachers. Think back to when you went to school and just imagine some of your classes, some of your classes were filled with a ton of super bright attentive students who put forth their best effort, and some were filled with kids who just dicked around and didn't give a shit, look to your fourth paragraph where you say these students pull you down. This is completely random (other than the fact the more remedial classes will have a higher concentration of the second). So tell me then, how we are supposed to evaluate performance. Teachers are already evaluated by their principal and their peers on their actual teaching methods etc. They might not be paid according to the results though. + Show Spoiler +I agree teachers should be paid more, but nothing too outrageous(I don't know what the magic number is but it's more than it is now)because we can't forget the kids need school supplies etc, we need the budget to help the teachers, but also remember the schools need to run. It really comes down to how much schools cost to run, and how much we are giving them, and I think there are some areas in this that really need improving. I have never seen the accounting books, so maybe you can give us a better picture for where the hell the money goes.
The problem with special ed in a lot of places is that they are held to the same standards on tests that other students are at least for No Child Left Behind was concerned when I was in school, my high school in particular several years ago, because test scores = money, trying to get rid of students and put them in other places, despite the costs too others, might actually be a legitimate strategy, I don't know. I also don't know if Race to the Top holds special ed students to the same standards NCLB did or does would need to do research.
I completely one hundred percent agree that college is not for everyone, and it really sucks for a lot of peoples bank accounts and lives that they have to go through a year or two or three to find that out. I think quicker paths to careers would be great, I wish that the system worked where you applied for a job or field you really wanted after maybe 2 year(FREE) college where you take all sorts of core classes + a special focus on what your interested in, then you showed your willingness to learn the appropriate skills etc in the interviews for the job/field then you go to work for them as an apprentice with a decent wage and your company supplies you with the proper training, additional classes/schooling etc that you need to work the trade, after completing the training etc then you get paid big time!(not discarded for more apprentices, they invested in you by paying for this training, schooling, so they have a reason to give you good benefits and stick around, if they pay for it, it's really hard to lose you to another company, so more competition). For instance my grandfather worked as an engineer for Raytheon, and they sent him back to school fully paid for to get his masters(he had a four year) because they liked him and his work and wanted him to do more than he was doing for them.
I'm going to respond to this part because I think its the most contentious. In my view the way to do it: Students are tested each year, you can place each student on the distribution of all students who took the test. Given enough data, you can pretty much expect on average how much a student is going to learn the next year. If a teacher does a good job, the students should outperform expectations, the opposite if not. This makes it so that even those students who have the best students can have poor performance if they don't improve their students enough that year. The sticky part is obviously the test. It can't be as easy as the standardized tests that are provided right now as the information for the high aptitude students will be lost. The content will also require scrutiny as it should be representative of the school curriculum and test stuff that is actually worth knowing. I think this method would work well for K-8 as there are generally standardized curriculum students receive until high school. There are a lot of ways this can go wrong, bad modeling of expectations, poorly designed tests, but I think the payoff would be that teachers actually have an incentive to think about how to improve their students.
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On October 10 2012 06:21 jdseemoreglass wrote:Show nested quote +On October 10 2012 06:19 sam!zdat wrote:
But what are "results"?
I don't think you can evaluate teachers on anything other than a qualitative basis. People need to keep in mind that it is not simply the teachers that need to be evaluated, it is the administrative system that surrounds them that has the problems and the inefficiencies. As far as how to measure performance, my solution is very simple. Leave it up to the parents. They know better than any bureaucrat what a good school or teacher looks like. Give them the money, don't send it to failing schools to reward their failure.
Lol yes... The average person can simply pick up where they live and move, pay for the extra 20 dollars in gas per day to drive...
I wish I lived in that world where moving came so easy and finances weren't an issue, what a magical world that would be.
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Cayman Islands24199 Posts
On October 10 2012 06:21 jdseemoreglass wrote:Show nested quote +On October 10 2012 06:19 sam!zdat wrote:
But what are "results"?
I don't think you can evaluate teachers on anything other than a qualitative basis. People need to keep in mind that it is not simply the teachers that need to be evaluated, it is the administrative system that surrounds them that has the problems and the inefficiencies. As far as how to measure performance, my solution is very simple. Leave it up to the parents. They know better than any bureaucrat what a good school or teacher looks like. Give them the money, don't send it to failing schools to reward their failure.
this is ok for those parents who are passionately engaged in the education of their kids, but it is still an approach along the lines of "it's not my problem as long as it does not affect me." to genuine proponents of the voucher system, much of the problem with failing schools is that your kids are in them, not that the school has a 20% graduation rate or 3% going to college. kids really are affected by their cohorts, and parents understandably want to get their kids out of a bad neighborhood or influence.
this is not to say vouchers are bad. just that they are incomplete. they do not solve the social problem on a very basic level.
in contrast, a solution that does seem more favorable to the idea of raising overall level of education, even for the undesirable, is to raise the general level of excellence in schools and make it more of an influence on kids. part of the problem may be cultural, but i think it is just a problem that has a very big cost and people are not going to pay for it.
instead, opting for the get the hell out of dodge easy way out.
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On October 10 2012 06:26 NeMeSiS3 wrote:Show nested quote +On October 10 2012 06:21 jdseemoreglass wrote:On October 10 2012 06:19 sam!zdat wrote:
But what are "results"?
I don't think you can evaluate teachers on anything other than a qualitative basis. People need to keep in mind that it is not simply the teachers that need to be evaluated, it is the administrative system that surrounds them that has the problems and the inefficiencies. As far as how to measure performance, my solution is very simple. Leave it up to the parents. They know better than any bureaucrat what a good school or teacher looks like. Give them the money, don't send it to failing schools to reward their failure. Lol yes... The average person can simply pick up where they live and move, pay for the extra 20 dollars in gas per day to drive... I wish I lived in that world where moving came so easy and finances weren't an issue, what a magical world that would be.
Who said anything about moving? And 20 dollars a day in gas to drive to a school? I've got probably 10 schools within 20 minutes driving distance. Forcing parents to go to a failing one because of their address is more immoral in my opinion than giving them the OPTION to drive somewhere else.
On October 10 2012 06:28 oneofthem wrote:Show nested quote +On October 10 2012 06:21 jdseemoreglass wrote:On October 10 2012 06:19 sam!zdat wrote:
But what are "results"?
I don't think you can evaluate teachers on anything other than a qualitative basis. People need to keep in mind that it is not simply the teachers that need to be evaluated, it is the administrative system that surrounds them that has the problems and the inefficiencies. As far as how to measure performance, my solution is very simple. Leave it up to the parents. They know better than any bureaucrat what a good school or teacher looks like. Give them the money, don't send it to failing schools to reward their failure. this is ok for those parents who are passionately engaged in the education of their kids, but it is still an approach along the lines of "it's not my problem as long as it does not affect me." to genuine proponents of the voucher system, much of the problem with failing schools is that your kids are in them, not that the school has a 20% graduation rate or 3% going to college. kids really are affected by their cohorts, and parents understandably want to get their kids out of a bad neighborhood or influence. this is not to say vouchers are bad. just that they are incomplete. they do not solve the social problem on a very basic level. in contrast, a solution that does seem more favorable to the idea of raising overall level of education, even for the undesirable, is to raise the general level of excellence in schools and make it more of an influence on kids. part of the problem may be cultural, but i think it is just a problem that has a very big cost and people are not going to pay for it. instead, opting for the get the hell out of dodge easy way out.
It's not simply about getting kids out of bad schools. It's about forcing the existing schools to not be bad schools if they want any funding. If they cannot achieve this, then another school can. The purpose of choice is competition, which is the cure for lack of accountability.
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EPT
