A great read if you have a few minutes: http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2008/12/15/081215fa_fact_gladwell?currentPage=all. Fascinating piece on the world of talent evaluation--in this case, NFL quarterbacks, financial planners, and most importantly, teachers. It may surprise you when it comes to teachers what is and is not ultimately important. As a society, we do a lousy job at finding, hiring, and keeping good teachers while hanging on to the crappy ones. There's a lot of blame for that, notably the teaching profession itself that goes to great lengths to protect its own, regardless of their level of suckitude. You hearing this, NEA? It's pretty damn obvious that change is warranted and will His Holiness have the political stones to go against an organization that worships the very water he walks on? That's recognizing, of course, the questionable water quality coming out of Chicago these days.
Also, Chase Daniels blows.
3 comments:
He would as an NFL qb.
Nice article, and it indeed points out the root of the education problem in America. Matters not - we're in for at least four years of "throw more money at it" government, whose leaders and supporters find results-based qualifying to be an anathema, and hiring/firing/promoting decisions made using such guidelines to be both repugnant and racist.
I've only been on the sidelines of the education debacle, but have learned enough to know that it will never be corrected, at least not in this country, on a wide scale.
Not that it's a big deal, but I once served on the school board of my daughters' Catholic school. Essentially, the primary thing that I learned from that experience is that brick and mortar and all of that other stuff doesn't really matter. What is meaningful is the quality of the teachers and the commitment by parents to helping in the education process. If you don't have these, you can throw all the money you want at new buildings, diversity programs, and feel good mantras and it won't make much of a difference.
Yep, and serious commitment by parents can even overcome poor to mediocre teachers in the short term.
However, an ever-increasing segment (fuck it, let's just call a spade a spade - a MAJORITY) of our population doesn't feel they should be burdened by such responsibility. Ain't their job. Damn the consequences - it's the governments job. As many parents of problem kids used to tell a teacher buddy of mine, "that's an 8:00-3:00 problem, that ain't my problem..."
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