I’ll try to write this as briefly and coherently as possible.
I’ve been listening to Power 92 in the mornings and they’ve been talking about a school in Houston looking to do something about 400 teachers because their student test scores are so low. A high school in Rhode Island just decided to fire 74 teachers because less than half the school was graduating. That’s the back story, now for my input.
First, we need to find a new way to measure success. Standardized tests don’t cut it. I went to school with some smart kids who were terrible test takers. Fortunately I was an awesome test taker but I’m a terrible student (homework and whatnot). We’ve also heard the debate on whether or not standardized test like the SAT are culturally & racially biased. Furthermore, I know students who weren’t academically brilliant but will no doubt be productive members of our society. I don’t know what we should be measuring but it’s not test scores. That’s unfair to teachers and students.
Secondly, it is time for these teachers to change the way they do things. About 85% of my college friends are going to be (or already are) teachers, and that excites me because they’re all great people (of course I’m slightly biased), but I can’t help think the old wave of teachers are still trying to get by on old standards of success and education. I’m also reminded of a night I spent last year around several teachers who’s alcoholic intake was pretty high. They were all sitting around playing poker and talking about students. Turns out, they’re all latently racist. I sat and listened to these privileged, middle to upper class white teachers recount stories while they made fun of student names like Kamisha. One teacher told a story of the other faculty members calling the black students Canadians. You get that? Canadians. They were using Canadians as code for nigger. Think I’m wrong? That’s cool, leave it in the comments. During the stories I didn’t laugh, I didn’t even smile, I sat there with disgust in my stomach and texted my friend saying, “I’m sitting with a bunch of racist teachers. I swear if you’re not a better teacher than these people I will come kick your ass, wherever you are.” He assured me he’d do the best he could. This is a very specific example, from a specific school and city, so I’m not saying all teachers are like this, but I’m guessing there are lots of jaded teachers out there who have their own prejudices and preconceptions about students.
At any rate, the discussion on Power 92 is whether or not teachers should be held responsible in this manner. I believe it’s a give and take relationship. You can’t hold teachers entirely responsible because there are circumstances and factors outside of their control, but their obviously needs to be some sort of reform. I’m excited about the new era of teachers who will hopefully reshape the education system and bring a little more positivity into it.
p.s. I’d really like to rant about school lunches but this isn’t the post for that. However, i think they are a contributing factor in education performance.
Weigh-in with your comments, critiques, corrections, hate, love, whatever you got.