Very interesting video! It is unfortunate that Americans do not value education in the same way. Most parents today are less involved in the schooling of their children than ever before. I am not trying to say that all parents neglect the education of their children but the stats that I have seen support the decrease of parental involvement.
I also think that some of the "schools" of thought in the current Oklahoma education system that are having large negative impacts. These are tenure and the lack of performance accountability. Tenure should be a thing of the past. I am a firm believer that if someone is not performing they should be coached and if they can not fix it they should be let go (I don't want to seem harsh). Tenure does not prevent being fired but it does put schools at a disadvantage in wrongful termination law suits. Naturally, schools have become more tolerant of substandard teach expectations because of it. Second, performance accountability should be a must. There are a number of teachers that I can remember in my public school system that were lazy, unmotivated, and were basically riding the “not getting fired” train to retirement.
Lastly, during lay off season, this rule of last to be hired first to fired is absurd. There are a ton of highly qualified, highly motivated, extremely impactful educators that are sidelined because of such.
Carl, Thank you for your very insightful comments. I agree with you. Teachers need to compete based on their performance like every other job out there. The challenge is to find relevant measures to rate a teachers performance since children would hesitate to give a teacher a "poor" rating for fear of retaliation. The second challenge is to act. Action needs to be appropriate, timely and fit the severity of a poor teacher rating.
Very interesting video! It is unfortunate that Americans do not value education in the same way. Most parents today are less involved in the schooling of their children than ever before. I am not trying to say that all parents neglect the education of their children but the stats that I have seen support the decrease of parental involvement.
ReplyDeleteI also think that some of the "schools" of thought in the current Oklahoma education system that are having large negative impacts. These are tenure and the lack of performance accountability. Tenure should be a thing of the past. I am a firm believer that if someone is not performing they should be coached and if they can not fix it they should be let go (I don't want to seem harsh). Tenure does not prevent being fired but it does put schools at a disadvantage in wrongful termination law suits. Naturally, schools have become more tolerant of substandard teach expectations because of it. Second, performance accountability should be a must. There are a number of teachers that I can remember in my public school system that were lazy, unmotivated, and were basically riding the “not getting fired” train to retirement.
Lastly, during lay off season, this rule of last to be hired first to fired is absurd. There are a ton of highly qualified, highly motivated, extremely impactful educators that are sidelined because of such.
CB
Carl,
ReplyDeleteThank you for your very insightful comments. I agree with you. Teachers need to compete based on their performance like every other job out there. The challenge is to find relevant measures to rate a teachers performance since children would hesitate to give a teacher a "poor" rating for fear of retaliation. The second challenge is to act. Action needs to be appropriate, timely and fit the severity of a poor teacher rating.