I was an elementary school teacher for a decade to begin my working career. I was the first in the school every morning and the last to leave. I coached every team, directed choirs, plays and musicals, took kids on camping trips and various weekend tournaments and I was the lowest paid person on my staff, simply because of seniority. I received exceptional ratings every year, but those don’t translate into financial rewards. I loved teaching, but I couldn’t afford to do it anymore. I went into the private sector and worked 30 years in the energy industry, where merit pay (bonuses, stock options, etc.) can greatly exceed annual salary. I loved working with kids, but I don’t regret moving to the private sector.
Thanks for sharing your story, Alf! It sounds like you would’ve stayed in teaching if your hard work and strong results had led to a stable income. What a shame. I really wish we could reward teachers like you the way they deserve.
Would you like to earn $60,000 per year for educating your own children?
Government education costs 2x per student, compared to private schools, and 3x for universities.
Time for a turnaround:
1. Vouchers: give vouchers to parents or university students to pick up the best education they can find anywhere, even abroad. Vouchers could be divided and spent in different institutions/subjects/credits … even spent for homeschooling (paying parents who teach at home) or parent/teacher coops.
The school bus transport system money should also be voucherized. This would allow parents to send their kids to other schools.
Schools based on government buildings should be opened for out-of-district students.
In countries where local education is paid by local taxes, parent’s would get more voucher money in the high income districts, especially if the fertility in rich neighborhoods is usually lower. Granting equality of opportunity with equal vouchers is a political decision which would still not affect the effectiveness of the voucher system to increase competition.
2. Integral student evaluation and follow up: health, nutrition, IQ, exam results, home/neighborhood-problems, etc. Vaccination status is non of the school’s business: if vaccines work, then those vaccinated shouldn't worry about the unvaxxed, right?
3. Transparency. Live-streaming cameras in every class, automatically recorded and opened to every parent and the school supervision and director. Also in sport grounds.
4. Accountability. Open process to remove bad teachers run by parents.
5. Zero homework (class time for self-work), keeping the possibility to go faster/deeper by self-learning at home, e.g. practice, book-reading or with online courses/AI.
6. Ranked objective grades (max competition):
• Standardize exams.
• Tests should not be based on memorization but in understanding and applying key concepts, applicable to real life. Memory of facts isn’t a useful skill in the internet era. What’s important is to know where and how to retrieve the required information, and how to process it. The litmus test is that those few key tested concepts are still alive years after the course is over.
• Anonymize the exams for correction (100% merit).
• Teachers get to grade random students from other States (if not possible, at least districts), never their own.
• Normalize grades (Gauss-curve/normal distribution) above passing-grade, for each grading-teacher (removes the bias of stingy/generous teachers). The passing requirement should be as objective as possible, preferably multiple-choice, so there’s no room for letting students pass in order to get a better evaluation or fake “performance” money.
• Appeal process: automatic blind correction by another random teacher.
• Publish the grades per teacher and schools.
• Teacher peer and student evaluation: anonymized so they don’t get pressured. Answers must be justified.
• “Only teach the test” problem? Tests could randomly pick questions make by the teacher pool and if applicable, changing the numbers and the order of the right answer/s. Teachers are rewarded for submitting approved questions.
7. Micro-credit standardized system, where with teachers and school advice, parents or college students decide which subjects they want, the pace (slow/fast-track) and depth (high, medium, low), building a personalized education with core competences like math, thinking (logic, scientific method, critical and creative thinking, fast-reading, time-management, conflict resolution, negotiation, innovation/startups/business, financial responsibility), language/s, social skills (team collaboration, leadership, social intelligence, relationships), healthy lifestyles, etc., and core fields (humanities, science, computing&tech, biology/medicine, arts, sports, philosophy/civic duty/ethics/religion). Special needs track. No sex ed (that’s parental responsibility). No room for ideology (unscientific safe-sex, gender ideology, climate change/action, etc.).
Killing teacher/school creativity, or Montessori schools?: under a minimum standardized core, any teacher should be able to offer a new syllabus and let the market decide, with the help of student and peer scores, online cameras and an evaluation system something like a product-review with stars and comments. We don’t need memory robots but those who think outside the multiple-choice box. No phones class.
Polarization? Yes, this will lead to top teachers earning a fortune, remaining in the top by rejecting under-performing students or those who don’t pay a plus. The same would happen with top schools. Isn’t what top colleges do when screening applications? Isn’t what top sport teams do? Competition is good!
Norway only allows the cream of each class to obtain master degrees in teaching and they earn like lawyers and physicians. That should be policy! Intelligence is the most productive resource and the most cost-effective investment.
What if a teacher works unpaid overtime to keep at the top? Isn’t it unfair competition, dumping? If it’s good for the students, who can complain? It’s just competition. It’s parents who decide if they want their children involved in more school time than with other teachers.
Teachers should be able to reject students who don’t pass a minimum test of the core contents of the previous class. A fake pass, should raise a red flag, triggering:
a) an investigation about why he failed on a previous passed exam
b) if applicable, back-up classes so he can catch up until passing the exam
What if the parents just want laid-back children and choose the easy way? Who’s going to check on that? That’s what point 2 is for.
Social integration? Teachers or institutions would not be allowed to reject students in non-critical or non-competitive activities like sports, arts and crafts, extra-curricular, etc.
More here (including how you'd make the $60K at the end):
Don't be gullible! We need to be suspicious of anything coming from masons: good ideas have been weaponized before even mentioning them in public!
President John Quincy Adams: “Masonry ought forever to be abolished. It is wrong - essentially wrong - a seed of evil, which can never produce any good.”
Parents are not reasonable enough when it comes their children- they should not be scoring teachers. Just like each kid learns and likes each teacher differently. The teachers need better preparatory education- I have been a teacher for over 30 years and I see new teachers who don’t know their content or how to manage behavior- and it is tough, but parents also believe their kid was wronged - back in the day kids would be in trouble if the teacher called home- not now!! The solution isn’t so easy- but one thing I can say is if your kid isn’t in school 97% of the year the parent should be fined. There isn’t enough time to discuss all the issues- but if we want better outcomes then attendance is an easy start- also trade schools need to come back
My thots too of today parents, sadly for some school is merely a "free" sitter for Johnny & Suzy the "brats"...!
A good teacher brings students up for decent standardized testing and it'll show on the spectrum of scoring per various class comparisons;
We all had good, some great, and sadly not so great teacher's, tgat will reveal itself, tho having interclass student help, not merely competition is also incentive for those falling behind, which should garner extra credits on a good students record...!
His idea is bad for one reason. Teachers will not work at schools with low economic status kids, with parents that are not involved. They will work in rich areas. Half the problem of schools is that the parents dont care and are illiterate themselves.
Teachers who enjoy teaching are more involved and tend to have better outcomes. Anyone who has had school aged children can identify the "best" teachers. Reward them!
I’ve been saying this for years. As a physical therapist my patients fill out a satisfaction survey afte they are done. Why can’t students and parents do the same and rate their teachers. Low scores get fired .
You have no idea how many parent/teacher conferences I attended that I could NEVER get a straight answer out if the teachers in how they were preparing my child for the future, it was always the same response. We were have a certain curriculum we are required to follow, Ok but I wasn’t seeing the preparation for her future in that curriculum!
When she graduated High school ( never received a satisfaction letter for her grade school or middle school) I really let them have it because I didn’t feel the teachers had done very good preparation for when she would be entering into college and what she could expect from becoming a college student!
Children can be 'different' and Parents can be 'Different' with how they perceive their children are treated......Catering to a child's whims for instance.
Teachers who are experts in a field of significance, love the subject/skill and the kids, can see what part of that subject responds to what's behind that thing you disparagingly call a ''whim''.... That's what it means to love their subject.....
I mean this very kindly: I suggest hanging out on the reddit forums for teachers for a while. While there are some really misguided teachers there, the stories about parents' wildly misguided expectations are what to look for.
Recently, a topic of discussion was the sudden increase in parents' expectations that teachers would change their kindergartners' or first graders' diapers. Those parents are letting their kids "decide" when to stop messing themselves, without any guidance as to that being a desirable thing; the kids will not get the idea that they are supposed to start using a toilet while the parents just demand that everyone clean their kid up until that unlikely event happens. Those parents are not in any state of mind to correctly evaluate what their kids are being taught, because they have no expectations of *education*. They just expect body service, and compliance with demands that are not even part of education.
There are entire classrooms with students whose parents don't engage with their kids' learning at all. This uninvolvement goes well beyond not reading to their kids, to not engaging with teaching their kids *anything*. Those parents also aren't able to evaluate teachers. The kids of those parents simply are not going to learn at anything like a formerly normal pace, because school hours are only part of how a kid learns to learn, even though school is where the progress of all the mental development, that a kid is supposed to acquire from constantly supported growth, is evaluated. Yes it is the only place it's formally evaluated, but parents are supposed to be heavily involved. There are way too many parents who don't realize this.
How entertaining... You've been trolled, as reddit is known for...
For example, the kid is in the custody of their parents and housekeepers for over 50% of the days of a school year AND SO IF diapering is still the norm then they are very involved with that child... unbelievable UNLESS the child is VACCINE DAMAGED, but then that runs into the idea that vaccine damage rates are ghastly and getting worse but whole classrooms is beyond the pale...
And I'll not go into the crucial quality [sarcasm alert] of the curriculum ---even at any time in k-12 -- as it's so boring b/c it's dumbed down to the point of making diaper science look intriguing compared to the graphic Hollywood weird sex currently needed to get attention when the subject matter is so dumbdown boring... Troll alert....... ttyna
how stupid you are. An entire passel of earnest schoolteachers doesn't "troll". There is a natural, or intuitive, or some label like that, child raising movement afoot. Look it up and learn something this year.
Either those teachers are stupid or part of the cover up of vaccine injury...
As for parental involvement [or lack thereof] being the answer, that's grossly unfair to parents of children damaged by vaccines and slanderous to cultures where diaper-free is normal..
Cultures that practice diaper-free child raising are not what's causing sanitation messes. It's vaccine damaging causing adhd, autism spectrum, etc and that percentage is barely 10% by kindergarten, diminishing to 5% by age 10... not roomfuls.. And the reason teachers can't escape it is the law on people with disabilities
That's how the laws on DISABILITY come into the scene to require those charged with care for people with disabilities to adjust to their needs. Pretending it's parents' fault when it's vaccine damage is a clear indication that the vaunted teacher training is totally covering up the pharma crimes
Children raised ''diaper-free'' are fully able to cope with independent restroom functions... So the idea that there are whole room fulls and that it's parental training failure is inexcusable as anything but trolling by YOU.. ttyna
One example was a 3rd grader who discreetly started a club..."I hate 'Suzie-Q Club" from the next classroom....you can surmise the qualifications of all members. Suzie-Q's Mom had to have principal put a stop to it as No teacher had any whiff of these goings on: homeroom, Science & Computer Labs, P.E. Music, Creative Arts, etc. Both girls were actually smart, cute, Leader personalities, etc. in classroom. The Problem was well-addressed! Instigators Mother was the ONLY one to disagree with aspects of how her own 'daughter' was TREATED. Very wealthy, prestigious in the community, school-board pull, etc. Unpleasant for all BUT handled and we all got through it.......GUESS what happened the following year? A repetition with more Honed Skills. Suzie-Q's Mother again required to take steps to RESCUE her child from the Bully Club! I don't know what the answer is....our Teachers all deserve Merit! But I KNOW this causes problems......You, do not know the answer either...YOUR TOOTING Your OWN Horn is all the PROOF required as.....of course Bullies don't 'see it that way'.
No, too many variables to consider. The biggest problem is that parents don’t have their kids ready to learn in kindergarten and 1st grade. Too many kids have emotional problems and need IEPs to accommodate them in learning. This problem is getting worse not better , probably for a whole host of reasons, including poor nutrition and food additives. Merit pay as been tried. Just not a fair way to make it work. Administrators need to do their job and cull incompetent teachers or put them on improvement plans and do their job with follow-up to make sure the teachers are actually improving. If they don’t improve, they aren’t meant to be teachers. The best teachers are called to the work. Like my daughter, she just seemed to know how to relate to kids and she loves her work.
I taught for 25 years (elementary, jr. high, and high school), and never encountered a single pedophile teacher. I did encounter for the most part, bright, moral people who taught well, cared about their students, and gave them their all, inspiring them as well as teaching the subject matter. Our union worked closely with the district, encouraging all of us to do our best. And the schools I taught in, in both states where I taught, were low socio-economically. I have always been proud to be a teacher--there are all kinds, of course, but your statement does not apply to my experience in the least.
Sorry but your ALL doesn't get us graduates that perform well in competition with other countries' graduates.... So I suspect that ALL needs a serious revision ... starting with subject matter and customization to each student's gifts, insights and life-needs. ttyl
Sounds good in theory but not sure it would work in practice. One person's idea of a good teacher is another person's idea of a bad one. It is hard to say what a good teacher is. Trying to measure performance by outcomes is also hard. Maybe Vivek, bless his socks, should stick to CEOing, leave teaching to teachers, and not try to reinvent the wheel all in an afternoon.
Indeed. A lot of armchair quarterbacks giving feedback.
To some extent, there is insight of those who actually attended public school.
On the other are actual teachers who have been on the front lines for one or more decades teaching and see what it's really like.
Unlike in industries where businesses can switch vendors, suppliers and get raw materials elsewhere, teachers cannot fire their students and get better quality ones.
They get their courseload assigned without question from administrators who left teaching, often as soon as possible, and many administrators never taught academic classes ever (school psychologists, guidance counselors, phys ed teachers).
If Vivek wants to push something novel, how about pushing for pay for homeschool teachers.
Homeschool is on the rise for myriad reasons and the homeschool kids I've met and taught tend to be some of the brightest, best-mannered, funniest and most creative.
That still looks like stupid acceptance that all is well designed in the system, though you seem to think it's the non-teaching staff's fault... Instead of recognizing that administrators are a product of the same teachers' colleges
Homeschoolers proved the system was a trap just to keep kids out of daily, community life-learning-involvements they need to learn in order to get what skills they need in their own life ahead... and SCHOOLING just makes them compliant to authorities
Even the food in the system is crap.
Proof: Some school in WI iirc switched to wholesome snacks as well as quality offerings in the cafeteria AND BEHAVIOR PROBLEM RATES diminished...dramatically..
You unfairly designate the students as the problem and need 'firing'..... Meanwhile the pharma trap is thoroughly set with kids on SSRIs instead of B3 for depression and such.
Once parents realize the level of involvement that's needed to get *good* results for their own offspring, maybe the whole system can be re-engineered...
Maybe to the benefit of the taxpayers as well...
OHIO NEEDS SCHOOL CHOICE, for a start too, maybe a crucial engine for change and for getting merit-pay for merit-teachers........ ttyl
School is a “Business” and the GrubMint Skools have Failed. A Fact, sort it out or whatever …. But Change Vendors Indeed !!!
Home School and Private School. If Republicans had half a brain they would put School Choice and Vouchers in Cities where they control the State Education Funding.
Alas, Estab Repubs are Quislings, and democRats are Bolshevik Apparachiks.
Government education costs 2x per student, compared to private schools, and 3x for universities. Time for a turnaround:
1. Give a voucher to parents or university students to pick up the best education they can find anywhere, even abroad. Vouchers could be divided and spent in different institutions/subjects/credits … even spent for homeschooling (paying parents who teach at home) or parent/teacher coops.
2. Personalized student evaluation and follow up: health, nutrition, IQ, exam results, etc. Vaccination status is non of the school’s business: if vaccines work, then those vaccinated shouldn't worry about the unvaxxed, right?
3. Live-streaming cameras in every class, automatically recorded and opened to every parent and the school supervision and director. Also in sport grounds.
4. Open process to remove bad teachers run by parents.
5. Zero homework (class time for self-work), keeping the possibility to go faster/deeper by self-learning at home, e.g. practice, book-reading or with online courses/AI.
6. Ranked objective grades (max competition):
• Standardize exams.
• Anonymize the exams for correction (100% merit).
• Teachers get to grade random students from classes, not their own.
• Normalize grades (Gauss-curve/normal distribution) above passing-grade, for each grading-teacher (removes the bias of stingy/generous teachers).
• Appeal process: automatic blind correction by another random teacher.
• Publish the grades per teacher and schools.
7. Micro-credit standardized system, where with teachers and school advice, parents or college students) decide which subjects they want, the pace (slow/fast-track) and depth (high, medium, low), building a personalized education with core competences (math, logic, language/s, fast-reading, creative thinking, etc.), core fields (humanities, science&tech, biology/medicine, arts, sports, philosophy/ethics/religion). Special needs track. No sex ed (that’s a parental responsibility). No room for ideology (unscientific safe-sex, gender ideology, climate change/action, etc.).
WARNING:
Is Vivek just another WEF-puppetician in politics?
Don't be gullible! We need to be suspicious of anything coming from masons: good ideas have been weaponized before even mentioning them in public!
President John Quincy Adams: “Masonry ought forever to be abolished. It is wrong - essentially wrong - a seed of evil, which can never produce any good.”
Thank you for your wealth of info and comments. Having Knowledge is the 1st step, Applying that Knowledge is the 2nd step, Multiplication from those steps is how a society can improve, If individuals so choose ….
I would advise Concentration on the positive of educational change as a Priority.
Attacking the negative is like stopping the fire engine on the way to the fire, to shoo the barking dogs away from chasing the fire truck. Put Out The Fire, First.
That does make sense what you are mentioning here! But of course your going to have parents who do not take an active role in their child’s education (as my mother is a great example of that, I had no guidance growing up) but as for my daughter I had started with her when she was 3 years old when I had her captive in the car, instead of handing her something distracting as I drove her to daycare (which I was not happy about but fortunately, I had a couple jobs that allowed me to participate in her school classroom extra curricular activities) I started teaching her, her address and phone number….just in case anything were to happen to her, ya just never know. The teachers were amazed at this because she was ahead of the other children in this area when she started school. Then when she came home from school I was working with her on her abc’s and spelling!
I also got her involved in volunteering and getting involved with our community!
This helped her tremendously when she got into college with having volunteered!
She is now (29 yrs of age) a very successful and smart young woman, because of the guidance I gave her!
But unfortunately, we haven’t spoken for almost 4 years due to a ridiculous disagreement that she is holding against me!
You almost homeschooled... I wonder whether that disagreement would have dissolved much sooner, as homeschoolers with their wider view of life, tend to have much better relationships with siblings and parents... ttyl
Where did I say I homeschooled in my comment! My comment was about being an active parent in my child’s education, unlike the majority of parents who literally drop off their children and leave their education up to the “system”!
So sorry to hear that and you worked so hard on her education. Somehow you need to ment the fence. Sometimes parents have to give in even if you don’t agree. Just agree to others her and keep your thoughts to yourself. Try to mend the fence mom. The indifference has kept you apart for 4 years? You have a plate of pancakes, when you eat them all you have nothing left. Life is short enough without those pancakes. God bless!
Believe me, I have tried to mend the fence. I have left messages when I call her but am ignored! Unfortunately, there is nothing I can do when your completely ignored! She made that choice, not me
I pulled my son out of public school and he started at a small Christian learning center as a freshman. He receives his core classes there and we take care of his extracurricular classes. It’s one of the best decision decisions we’ve made. He’s home more, experiences less stress from negative peer influences and the weird DEI/social justice movements in public school. His grades and learning are exponentially better and he’s happy.
Maybe you should heed your own advice...who ever said Vivek is trying to reinvent the wheel in an afternoon...those are your words! So dismissive are we? Apparently you take this personally....I've also been CEO/CFO and also professor in MBA grad school. This can be figured out...merit and results some hybrid...we all know the current system is not working...and gentle tweaks is not the answer. Buggy whips are gone. PLUS the current system is corrupted by leftists marxists idealogy. Anybody with an objective brain knows that public schools and some teachers have lost their way over the last 50 years...about the same time the DOE and marxism grew...hmm...study that...hmm...is there a correlation???
I agree David. Teaching is not quite like running a business. Vivek probably needs to let people handle this issue that understand this issue. Maybe Administrators should do their job and cull teachers that don’t cut it before they are tenured. Not that I believe in tenure, but that is how the system works. Or, maybe a new teacher actually should work with an older teacher for a full year before being given a class. New teacher might have more confidence, especially in the area of discipline, if she/he had more time to gain knowledge.
Teaching is like not like buying or selling. It is not like war. It is more like parenting. A teacher can be good on one day in one school with one group of students and bad on another in another with another group. Severus Snape was often a bully, sometimes unjust, sometimes even cruel but he sacrificed himself to save the world. Was he a bad teacher? I think he is a portrayal of a Great teacher. If the enthusiastic likes of our Vivek had their way - judging by the above described merit system - Snape would have been kicked from the towers of Hogwarts never to save the world or educate anybody, let alone Harry Potter. It is as hard to say what a good teacher is as it is to say what a good wife or husband or friend or lover is. These things cannot be reduced to numbers. Vivek is well intentioned, of course, and he is whippet smart, no doubt, but teaching is first a vocation, we are born to it, and merit and performance charts and pay by results are, for me, not the best way to improve things - and he is right, they do need improving. If I were President I would do one thing. Just one. Treble teachers pay.
As a middle school teacher, I might disagree with you that teaching kids this age is not like war. I’ve never fought in a war, but at the very least I have to imagine it’s a close 2nd.
“Leaving teaching to teachers” IS a major part of the problem but not the whole problem. Lack of parenting and grandparenting is a big part of the problem as well. An ignorant nation is an opportunity for a totalitarian nation.
Yeah well I can think back to both teachers and professors that should NOT have been there, they were not ab asset to the profession and definitely NOT students but merely a job to slide thru on, yet great teachers that really mm ade tbe difference should be a knowledged and rewarded while losers should do somethingbelse = same for LEO's or any public servant that is NOT up for, good at or a problem...!
WRONG... when a teacher is genuinely an expert in their subject, AND that subject is genuinely producing life-skills, then customization to individual students' desires to learn that skill leads to every student/parent seeing benefit....
So ask those homeschoolers who dumped the whole schooling and outperform the schooled...
Vivek's CEOing is registering the shortfall in the stinking school system and ready to roll up his sleeves... ttyl
Just because a teacher is "genuinely an expert in their subject" doesn't mean they can teach. So much depends on HOW a teacher teachs and relates to students.
The devil is in the details. Merit and performance based on what? Do we throw out the outliers in the student and parent surveys? My peers hardly ever saw me in the classroom - so what do they know about my teaching? Do we measure results by pre and post test improvement so we aren't just rewarding the teachers who inherit the best students? What kind of test do we give for courses like automotive or computer game development? Do teachers who spend the most time making the Principal look good get the highest ranking? Tough questions.
New York tried this (and failed) with its APPR boondoggle: Millions of dollars and man hours wasted assembling "Annual Professional Performance Reviews".
It was gamed. It got lawsuits. New York lost bad and just recently (and quietly) abandoned the whole program.
APPR featured "SLOs" (student learning outcomes) and HEDI Scores
Highly Effective
Effective
Developing
Insufficient
It was a disaster. Talented teachers were having nervous attacks. The incompetent ones could have cared less.
Totally agree, the DEVIL is in the details, and the details extend far beyond the student, teacher, or school district. Parents- if they exist - and communities must be actively involved, and individual leaders ( teachers) need to be supported, their skill set made a priority. Merit pay?, a possible option, but please recognize that getting enhanced training and certificates is a merit pay system. Performance auditing? Well, we are seeing the effects of a severe lack of leadership and auditing of our government programs. Bottom line, these points of discussion go far beyond the school door - common sense, ethics, morals, standards, personal values and commitments are in the tank. Those will not be quickly, easily, or totally solved - IMHO.
Sorry no, it's a stupid idea that was tried and failed decades ago.
Steve Jobs suffered from similar failed thinking before he passed.
School shouldn't be a popularity contest, nor should it be a place where pushy parents on the PTA and school boards get special privileges for their children - yet all of this happens. Have watched it over 50 years in education.
Kids aren't uniform widgets, but human beings with different intelligences.
I've been "all in" on education, grades K-12, community college, undergraduate, graduate, have all the degrees through doctorate, multiple certifications, have been invited to every local, state, regional and national conferences to present papers, have taught internationally, been on advisory boards and president of my teaching organizations.
Your "all in" does not relate to student needs as much as it indicates yours and the bureaucractic need to enhance individual teacherl profiles - to what benefit - increased salary options? Obviously, the students have suffered under that game plan.
My "all-in" garnered the second highest standardized test result in the state, missing the #1 spot by a single student's results.
That's an "on paper win" but the more important "wins" are intangible: I've had more students than I can count tell me I've saved their lives or changed them for the better: Kids getting off drugs, straightening out their lives, switching careers, finding religion, learning to think critically, etc. They've had me and my family in their homes for Thanksgiving, graduations, weddings and family events.
The home we live in is heated and cooled as a thank you from a former student for saving his sister's life.
Where I work tried merit pay before and it was an abject failure. It's impossible to account for the variables.
Read Lee's comments above. Lee sees the flaws in the suggestion.
Your stated results speak more towards your individual value sets and ability to apply the supplemental learned skills/knowledge than any papered degrees you've received. I applaud that, not so much the wall plaques.
You grant that kids aren't widgets, and claim to have walked the walk, yet I hear no advocacy for SCHOOL CHOICE as the solution for ALL PARENTS to be heard, and ALL STUDENTs to have their individual learning styles served... and Teachers with dedication to those learning styles or whatever would find rewarding work and a chance for appropriate recognition....
MAYBE Vivek would recognize SCHOOL CHOICE as the driver needed...
Expanding it with some ideas from EdChoice and The Buckeye Institute or online homeschooling groups for feedback... TTYL
I'm not against many of Trump's radical actions, but as a former teacher I cannot get on board with this. There are WAY too many variables in classrooms and schools. I challenge anyone to spend a week as a teacher in an average classroom and think that money alone will inspire a teacher to be "great". In some schools, folks would say "there is not enough money in the world to make me want to stay here". and yet so many GOOD teachers do. because it's not about the money. It's about the kids.
Our parents are distracted and stressed. Our homes are broken. Our communities are struggling. And kids reflect all of that. Each child brings that struggle into a classroom. A teacher gets to accommodate for 30 -100+ students with their own struggles every day. Oh, and teach them information that is sometimes relevant to their lives. "Merit" is a joke. Most teachers I know work their asses off and don't need an additional measure of someone elses idea of "merit" added to their job. Schools are not businesses. Our children are not products on an assembly line. That thinking is what causes so much problem in schools already.
This was well stated. You hit the nail on the head. Too many nuances in young human beings for a blanket program they will run into the ground like they do with everything. Humans are not commodities, but the government thinks we are!
"Our parents are distracted and stressed. Our homes are broken. Our communities are struggling. And kids reflect all of that." THIS is the problem going back about 30 years. The book "It Takes a Village" and Hilary Clinton's messing in the US educational system is what began the downslide in the 1990's. Most people forget that since we are so distant from it now with our 24/7 news cycles to make people forget anything that isn't in front of their face for that moment.
Sports is the god for most families now and those families are often single mother households. But that was the goal started in the 1990's to take down America from within and the destruction of the family to achieve that goal. How has that worked for us now?
So long as funding is tied to actual performance and not the number of kids to "pass", I agree. But it will depend on the definition of "performance." Funding is the reason we are in this terrible mess to begin with. The more kids that "pass," the more money the school district receives. My mother is a retired high school teacher of 30 years, and they are actively told to pass kids regardless of actual performance because that is how "performance" is evaluated, and frankly because of the outrage and pushback from parents if they are held back; school districts don't want to deal with unruly kids who refuse to pay attention and do nothing but watch TikTok while in class (because taking their phones is seen as a violation of their rights(!)), and further, because the funding they do receive goes towards admin. salaries, NOT decreasing class sizes, providing teachers with better pay, or the supplies/resources they need. It's all a grift, and I worry that it will continue to be the same if money is the reward.
Teachers who get the better track of students (the ones in band, or scheduled for honors / AP / IB programs) will look like superheroes while the others who get unruly kids, especially after meds have worn off, after being plied with GMO and corn-syrup laden lunch will look like failures.
This idea is so poorly thought out I wonder how much time Vivek spent on the other side of the podium teaching in a public school.
I agree with "performance" and defining it correctly is a huge issue - performance is a demonstrable skill set and not just passing kids for administrative metrics. This county's kids have paid the price.
My spouse is an early retired chemistry professor (mandates - but that's a different story). Over the decades, students arriving at the university - small jesuit liberal arts school, great scholastic reputation - cannot perform simple math required, can't think critically, can't reason out if the answer the calculator spits out makes any sense, etc. Not only can these kids not do math and don't comprehend basic mathematical concepts, they have to be taught how to use their calculators - in college - not exaggerating. The students entering this school are generally kids with high high school gpa's. Many of these kids because of math issues leave chemistry as a major and default to majoring in biology due to less math and they think they'll have a better gpa to get into med school (could explain a few things there!). Students also have expectations that even though they're literally failing a chem class that they'll be automatically passed somehow. Nope. My spouse spent many office hours (and more) doing everything possible to help these kids. Some made it, some didn't. Also loads of hours counseling students about what to pursue next based on their interests.
I graduated from this school in the 80's with a chemistry degree. We all came in with math skills and the ability to think and problem solve. In grad school I taught the most basic chem class - the one for students who had weak math backgrounds who could get some more exposure before taking the standard chem class - shocked at how these kids were representative of my spouse's students.
There is no fair way to do it. The teacher who is assigned highly motivated students gets rewarded while the teacher who struggles with a recalcitrant student gets nothing even though they have the more difficult job. High stakes testing is not the answer. It will only lead to cheating. I don’t think Vivek can come up with a fair evaluation that doesn’t promote cheating.
The only way this will work is to let teachers actually teach. Stop controlling how they teach in their classrooms. Give teachers the ability to create a stimulating way of presenting the material instead of forcing them to teach to the standardized tests. They have to be given a chance to be creative with their lesson plans so it holds the student’s attention. This is where much of the breakdown in classrooms is coming from. Teachers are largely just reading curriculum from books. Children pick up on that lack of preparation & get bored. They turn off & become a discipline problem. Teachers need the freedom to get back to teaching the basics. I think K-7th grade should leave computer technology out of classrooms. Leave computers for high school & just let teachers focus on the basics. Kids need this foundation first.
Absolutely agree. No technology for young children! It’s dangerous for them to be that close to it. Children need to learn how to socialize and think logically for themselves first. No cell phones at school either. How can teachers teach with all those distractions? In our county, every kid gets a Chromebook in 1st grade. Why? Let kids be kids. They pick up on that stuff so quickly, they won’t be behind in technology if it waits until high school.
I think we’ve seen what happens when teachers determine curriculum for themselves. They turn into activist teachers, teaching what they care about - preparing their students for a new world. One with safe spaces, participation trophies and “inclusivity”. And our students get dumber and dumber.
Good point, however, I think that is the built-in indoctrination coming from NGO’s & government. It’s the DEI stuff we don’t want for kids. The freedom to teach I’m talking about is where the good teachers honestly & earnestly plan their lessons so the kids actively learn & participate in their learning. A more nuanced comprehensive approach that incorporates whole body activities (ie:marching while doing math exercises, or working in small groups). The great teachers leave out of frustration with being pigeonholed to teach to the test. Those standardized test scores have to be high. So they make sure the kids know the answers they’ll see on the test. There’s no time left for true heart centered learning. Where kids move forward to the next grade always having a reverence for that awesome teacher who made a difference in their life. Kids desperately need that these days. They need awesome, kind, loving, encouraging, devoted teachers who truly care about their future & their educational success. DEI hires don’t truly care about these things. They have nefarious intentions to indoctrinate their ideology onto impressionable minds. That is very different from what I’m talking about. Thanks for pointing this out though. The DEI shit has to stop. Have a great day!
I always made a living as a tutor and worked at Stanley Kaplan tutoring MCAT, LSAT, GMAT and GRE examinations. Some people have a knack for teaching whole other people don’t. W. Manion, MDPHDJDMBA
I did not know that Spanish statement but now that you made that statement I would tend to agree with you. I have had teachers in Law School, Medical School, Graduate School, Business School, College, etc. The best teachers can simplify concepts, identify what you should learn, and give you memory aids or mnemonics to help you remember important concepts. Thank you for your great comment. W. Manion, MDPHDJDMBA
No. You want to build a team with good teaching and learning ethics. Merit pay is never truly meritorious in education because the intangibles just don't get measured. Instead you get favoritism, cheating, bias, shunning, resentment and a disintegrating learning environment. Better to have a good, fixed salary schedule with plenty of peer evaluation and regular cross-classroom visits.
Teachers today are given classes filled with a mix of children. Several that do not speak english, several that have been diagnosed with ADD, several that are brilliant, and a host of other issues. Classes need to be re-structured so that the children are placed in groups where they can learn
Vivek has a great idea! Merit based.. yes sir.. If our society had it's act together, teachers would be among the highest paid.. not professional athletes..
I was an elementary school teacher for a decade to begin my working career. I was the first in the school every morning and the last to leave. I coached every team, directed choirs, plays and musicals, took kids on camping trips and various weekend tournaments and I was the lowest paid person on my staff, simply because of seniority. I received exceptional ratings every year, but those don’t translate into financial rewards. I loved teaching, but I couldn’t afford to do it anymore. I went into the private sector and worked 30 years in the energy industry, where merit pay (bonuses, stock options, etc.) can greatly exceed annual salary. I loved working with kids, but I don’t regret moving to the private sector.
Thanks for sharing your story, Alf! It sounds like you would’ve stayed in teaching if your hard work and strong results had led to a stable income. What a shame. I really wish we could reward teachers like you the way they deserve.
Would you like to earn $60,000 per year for educating your own children?
Government education costs 2x per student, compared to private schools, and 3x for universities.
Time for a turnaround:
1. Vouchers: give vouchers to parents or university students to pick up the best education they can find anywhere, even abroad. Vouchers could be divided and spent in different institutions/subjects/credits … even spent for homeschooling (paying parents who teach at home) or parent/teacher coops.
The school bus transport system money should also be voucherized. This would allow parents to send their kids to other schools.
Schools based on government buildings should be opened for out-of-district students.
In countries where local education is paid by local taxes, parent’s would get more voucher money in the high income districts, especially if the fertility in rich neighborhoods is usually lower. Granting equality of opportunity with equal vouchers is a political decision which would still not affect the effectiveness of the voucher system to increase competition.
2. Integral student evaluation and follow up: health, nutrition, IQ, exam results, home/neighborhood-problems, etc. Vaccination status is non of the school’s business: if vaccines work, then those vaccinated shouldn't worry about the unvaxxed, right?
3. Transparency. Live-streaming cameras in every class, automatically recorded and opened to every parent and the school supervision and director. Also in sport grounds.
4. Accountability. Open process to remove bad teachers run by parents.
5. Zero homework (class time for self-work), keeping the possibility to go faster/deeper by self-learning at home, e.g. practice, book-reading or with online courses/AI.
6. Ranked objective grades (max competition):
• Standardize exams.
• Tests should not be based on memorization but in understanding and applying key concepts, applicable to real life. Memory of facts isn’t a useful skill in the internet era. What’s important is to know where and how to retrieve the required information, and how to process it. The litmus test is that those few key tested concepts are still alive years after the course is over.
• Anonymize the exams for correction (100% merit).
• Teachers get to grade random students from other States (if not possible, at least districts), never their own.
• Normalize grades (Gauss-curve/normal distribution) above passing-grade, for each grading-teacher (removes the bias of stingy/generous teachers). The passing requirement should be as objective as possible, preferably multiple-choice, so there’s no room for letting students pass in order to get a better evaluation or fake “performance” money.
• Appeal process: automatic blind correction by another random teacher.
• Publish the grades per teacher and schools.
• Teacher peer and student evaluation: anonymized so they don’t get pressured. Answers must be justified.
• “Only teach the test” problem? Tests could randomly pick questions make by the teacher pool and if applicable, changing the numbers and the order of the right answer/s. Teachers are rewarded for submitting approved questions.
7. Micro-credit standardized system, where with teachers and school advice, parents or college students decide which subjects they want, the pace (slow/fast-track) and depth (high, medium, low), building a personalized education with core competences like math, thinking (logic, scientific method, critical and creative thinking, fast-reading, time-management, conflict resolution, negotiation, innovation/startups/business, financial responsibility), language/s, social skills (team collaboration, leadership, social intelligence, relationships), healthy lifestyles, etc., and core fields (humanities, science, computing&tech, biology/medicine, arts, sports, philosophy/civic duty/ethics/religion). Special needs track. No sex ed (that’s parental responsibility). No room for ideology (unscientific safe-sex, gender ideology, climate change/action, etc.).
Killing teacher/school creativity, or Montessori schools?: under a minimum standardized core, any teacher should be able to offer a new syllabus and let the market decide, with the help of student and peer scores, online cameras and an evaluation system something like a product-review with stars and comments. We don’t need memory robots but those who think outside the multiple-choice box. No phones class.
Polarization? Yes, this will lead to top teachers earning a fortune, remaining in the top by rejecting under-performing students or those who don’t pay a plus. The same would happen with top schools. Isn’t what top colleges do when screening applications? Isn’t what top sport teams do? Competition is good!
Norway only allows the cream of each class to obtain master degrees in teaching and they earn like lawyers and physicians. That should be policy! Intelligence is the most productive resource and the most cost-effective investment.
What if a teacher works unpaid overtime to keep at the top? Isn’t it unfair competition, dumping? If it’s good for the students, who can complain? It’s just competition. It’s parents who decide if they want their children involved in more school time than with other teachers.
Teachers should be able to reject students who don’t pass a minimum test of the core contents of the previous class. A fake pass, should raise a red flag, triggering:
a) an investigation about why he failed on a previous passed exam
b) if applicable, back-up classes so he can catch up until passing the exam
What if the parents just want laid-back children and choose the easy way? Who’s going to check on that? That’s what point 2 is for.
Social integration? Teachers or institutions would not be allowed to reject students in non-critical or non-competitive activities like sports, arts and crafts, extra-curricular, etc.
More here (including how you'd make the $60K at the end):
https://scientificprogress.substack.com/p/rethinking-education-for-the-21st
WARNING:
Is Vivek just another WEF-puppetician in politics?
https://scientificprogress.substack.com/p/the-real-vivek-ramaswampy
Don't be gullible! We need to be suspicious of anything coming from masons: good ideas have been weaponized before even mentioning them in public!
President John Quincy Adams: “Masonry ought forever to be abolished. It is wrong - essentially wrong - a seed of evil, which can never produce any good.”
Satanic Secret Societies for dummies:
https://scientificprogress.substack.com/p/sss-for-dummies
Who are The Powers That SHOULDN'T Be ?
https://scientificprogress.substack.com/p/criminal-intent
https://www.coreysdigs.com/global/who-is-they/
The end of money and freedom
https://scientificprogress.substack.com/p/uncle-sam-altman
LBJ killed JFK
https://scientificprogress.substack.com/p/lbj-killed-jfk
Weaponization of Justice: no democracy with Freemasonry!
https://scientificprogress.substack.com/p/weaponization-of-justice
Illuminati David Rockefeller, finest quotes:
https://scientificprogress.substack.com/p/david-rockefeller-illuminati
Confessions of ex illuminati Ronald Bernard:
https://scientificprogress.substack.com/p/confessions-of-illuminati-ronald
Illuminati Attali, finest quotes:
https://scientificprogress.substack.com/p/attali-illuminati-finest-quotes
Chisholm, father of the WHO’s global pedophilia
https://scientificprogress.substack.com/p/brock-chisholm-father-of-the-whos
Ex mason Serge Abad-Gallardo:
https://www.ncregister.com/interview/confessions-of-a-former-freemason-officer-converted-to-catholicism
16 laws we need to exit Prison Planet
https://scientificprogress.substack.com/p/laws-to-exit-planet-prison
Please share, not the articles, but the information! I'm expendable. Saving the free world, is not!
Parents are not reasonable enough when it comes their children- they should not be scoring teachers. Just like each kid learns and likes each teacher differently. The teachers need better preparatory education- I have been a teacher for over 30 years and I see new teachers who don’t know their content or how to manage behavior- and it is tough, but parents also believe their kid was wronged - back in the day kids would be in trouble if the teacher called home- not now!! The solution isn’t so easy- but one thing I can say is if your kid isn’t in school 97% of the year the parent should be fined. There isn’t enough time to discuss all the issues- but if we want better outcomes then attendance is an easy start- also trade schools need to come back
My thots too of today parents, sadly for some school is merely a "free" sitter for Johnny & Suzy the "brats"...!
A good teacher brings students up for decent standardized testing and it'll show on the spectrum of scoring per various class comparisons;
We all had good, some great, and sadly not so great teacher's, tgat will reveal itself, tho having interclass student help, not merely competition is also incentive for those falling behind, which should garner extra credits on a good students record...!
Thank you for your service. The best teachers are in it for the kids and the future of society!
Actual Love of teaching to reach and raise real Love of knowledge in the children given...!
Alf you are the teacher I looked up to when going to school as a child!
His idea is bad for one reason. Teachers will not work at schools with low economic status kids, with parents that are not involved. They will work in rich areas. Half the problem of schools is that the parents dont care and are illiterate themselves.
Well yes = caused by the very inadequate "Skrools" they were stuck in;
Really good teachers will reach those students and if will manefest:
"Stand And Deliver" I think was a movie made about such a situation...?
It was so rare they made a movie out of it.
Teachers who enjoy teaching are more involved and tend to have better outcomes. Anyone who has had school aged children can identify the "best" teachers. Reward them!
Maybe. But we’ve all had teachers that had questionable knowledge of their subject matter.
I’ve been saying this for years. As a physical therapist my patients fill out a satisfaction survey afte they are done. Why can’t students and parents do the same and rate their teachers. Low scores get fired .
You have no idea how many parent/teacher conferences I attended that I could NEVER get a straight answer out if the teachers in how they were preparing my child for the future, it was always the same response. We were have a certain curriculum we are required to follow, Ok but I wasn’t seeing the preparation for her future in that curriculum!
When she graduated High school ( never received a satisfaction letter for her grade school or middle school) I really let them have it because I didn’t feel the teachers had done very good preparation for when she would be entering into college and what she could expect from becoming a college student!
Children can be 'different' and Parents can be 'Different' with how they perceive their children are treated......Catering to a child's whims for instance.
Teachers who are experts in a field of significance, love the subject/skill and the kids, can see what part of that subject responds to what's behind that thing you disparagingly call a ''whim''.... That's what it means to love their subject.....
LIFE-LED LEARNING
ttyl
I mean this very kindly: I suggest hanging out on the reddit forums for teachers for a while. While there are some really misguided teachers there, the stories about parents' wildly misguided expectations are what to look for.
Recently, a topic of discussion was the sudden increase in parents' expectations that teachers would change their kindergartners' or first graders' diapers. Those parents are letting their kids "decide" when to stop messing themselves, without any guidance as to that being a desirable thing; the kids will not get the idea that they are supposed to start using a toilet while the parents just demand that everyone clean their kid up until that unlikely event happens. Those parents are not in any state of mind to correctly evaluate what their kids are being taught, because they have no expectations of *education*. They just expect body service, and compliance with demands that are not even part of education.
There are entire classrooms with students whose parents don't engage with their kids' learning at all. This uninvolvement goes well beyond not reading to their kids, to not engaging with teaching their kids *anything*. Those parents also aren't able to evaluate teachers. The kids of those parents simply are not going to learn at anything like a formerly normal pace, because school hours are only part of how a kid learns to learn, even though school is where the progress of all the mental development, that a kid is supposed to acquire from constantly supported growth, is evaluated. Yes it is the only place it's formally evaluated, but parents are supposed to be heavily involved. There are way too many parents who don't realize this.
How entertaining... You've been trolled, as reddit is known for...
For example, the kid is in the custody of their parents and housekeepers for over 50% of the days of a school year AND SO IF diapering is still the norm then they are very involved with that child... unbelievable UNLESS the child is VACCINE DAMAGED, but then that runs into the idea that vaccine damage rates are ghastly and getting worse but whole classrooms is beyond the pale...
And I'll not go into the crucial quality [sarcasm alert] of the curriculum ---even at any time in k-12 -- as it's so boring b/c it's dumbed down to the point of making diaper science look intriguing compared to the graphic Hollywood weird sex currently needed to get attention when the subject matter is so dumbdown boring... Troll alert....... ttyna
how stupid you are. An entire passel of earnest schoolteachers doesn't "troll". There is a natural, or intuitive, or some label like that, child raising movement afoot. Look it up and learn something this year.
Either those teachers are stupid or part of the cover up of vaccine injury...
As for parental involvement [or lack thereof] being the answer, that's grossly unfair to parents of children damaged by vaccines and slanderous to cultures where diaper-free is normal..
Cultures that practice diaper-free child raising are not what's causing sanitation messes. It's vaccine damaging causing adhd, autism spectrum, etc and that percentage is barely 10% by kindergarten, diminishing to 5% by age 10... not roomfuls.. And the reason teachers can't escape it is the law on people with disabilities
That's how the laws on DISABILITY come into the scene to require those charged with care for people with disabilities to adjust to their needs. Pretending it's parents' fault when it's vaccine damage is a clear indication that the vaunted teacher training is totally covering up the pharma crimes
Children raised ''diaper-free'' are fully able to cope with independent restroom functions... So the idea that there are whole room fulls and that it's parental training failure is inexcusable as anything but trolling by YOU.. ttyna
One example was a 3rd grader who discreetly started a club..."I hate 'Suzie-Q Club" from the next classroom....you can surmise the qualifications of all members. Suzie-Q's Mom had to have principal put a stop to it as No teacher had any whiff of these goings on: homeroom, Science & Computer Labs, P.E. Music, Creative Arts, etc. Both girls were actually smart, cute, Leader personalities, etc. in classroom. The Problem was well-addressed! Instigators Mother was the ONLY one to disagree with aspects of how her own 'daughter' was TREATED. Very wealthy, prestigious in the community, school-board pull, etc. Unpleasant for all BUT handled and we all got through it.......GUESS what happened the following year? A repetition with more Honed Skills. Suzie-Q's Mother again required to take steps to RESCUE her child from the Bully Club! I don't know what the answer is....our Teachers all deserve Merit! But I KNOW this causes problems......You, do not know the answer either...YOUR TOOTING Your OWN Horn is all the PROOF required as.....of course Bullies don't 'see it that way'.
No, too many variables to consider. The biggest problem is that parents don’t have their kids ready to learn in kindergarten and 1st grade. Too many kids have emotional problems and need IEPs to accommodate them in learning. This problem is getting worse not better , probably for a whole host of reasons, including poor nutrition and food additives. Merit pay as been tried. Just not a fair way to make it work. Administrators need to do their job and cull incompetent teachers or put them on improvement plans and do their job with follow-up to make sure the teachers are actually improving. If they don’t improve, they aren’t meant to be teachers. The best teachers are called to the work. Like my daughter, she just seemed to know how to relate to kids and she loves her work.
The unions hate merit but love their pedophiles members.
I taught for 25 years (elementary, jr. high, and high school), and never encountered a single pedophile teacher. I did encounter for the most part, bright, moral people who taught well, cared about their students, and gave them their all, inspiring them as well as teaching the subject matter. Our union worked closely with the district, encouraging all of us to do our best. And the schools I taught in, in both states where I taught, were low socio-economically. I have always been proud to be a teacher--there are all kinds, of course, but your statement does not apply to my experience in the least.
Sorry but your ALL doesn't get us graduates that perform well in competition with other countries' graduates.... So I suspect that ALL needs a serious revision ... starting with subject matter and customization to each student's gifts, insights and life-needs. ttyl
Not be negative, likely its the "Rubber Room" teachers still being paid tho not allowed to teach for crimes or unacceptable actions...!
I've only read about them too, never seen it with my own eyes, seems once in the NEA w/"tenor"you cannot be fired...?
Sounds good in theory but not sure it would work in practice. One person's idea of a good teacher is another person's idea of a bad one. It is hard to say what a good teacher is. Trying to measure performance by outcomes is also hard. Maybe Vivek, bless his socks, should stick to CEOing, leave teaching to teachers, and not try to reinvent the wheel all in an afternoon.
Indeed. A lot of armchair quarterbacks giving feedback.
To some extent, there is insight of those who actually attended public school.
On the other are actual teachers who have been on the front lines for one or more decades teaching and see what it's really like.
Unlike in industries where businesses can switch vendors, suppliers and get raw materials elsewhere, teachers cannot fire their students and get better quality ones.
They get their courseload assigned without question from administrators who left teaching, often as soon as possible, and many administrators never taught academic classes ever (school psychologists, guidance counselors, phys ed teachers).
If Vivek wants to push something novel, how about pushing for pay for homeschool teachers.
Homeschool is on the rise for myriad reasons and the homeschool kids I've met and taught tend to be some of the brightest, best-mannered, funniest and most creative.
Better quality students?
That still looks like stupid acceptance that all is well designed in the system, though you seem to think it's the non-teaching staff's fault... Instead of recognizing that administrators are a product of the same teachers' colleges
Homeschoolers proved the system was a trap just to keep kids out of daily, community life-learning-involvements they need to learn in order to get what skills they need in their own life ahead... and SCHOOLING just makes them compliant to authorities
Even the food in the system is crap.
Proof: Some school in WI iirc switched to wholesome snacks as well as quality offerings in the cafeteria AND BEHAVIOR PROBLEM RATES diminished...dramatically..
You unfairly designate the students as the problem and need 'firing'..... Meanwhile the pharma trap is thoroughly set with kids on SSRIs instead of B3 for depression and such.
Once parents realize the level of involvement that's needed to get *good* results for their own offspring, maybe the whole system can be re-engineered...
Maybe to the benefit of the taxpayers as well...
OHIO NEEDS SCHOOL CHOICE, for a start too, maybe a crucial engine for change and for getting merit-pay for merit-teachers........ ttyl
School is a “Business” and the GrubMint Skools have Failed. A Fact, sort it out or whatever …. But Change Vendors Indeed !!!
Home School and Private School. If Republicans had half a brain they would put School Choice and Vouchers in Cities where they control the State Education Funding.
Alas, Estab Repubs are Quislings, and democRats are Bolshevik Apparachiks.
Government education costs 2x per student, compared to private schools, and 3x for universities. Time for a turnaround:
1. Give a voucher to parents or university students to pick up the best education they can find anywhere, even abroad. Vouchers could be divided and spent in different institutions/subjects/credits … even spent for homeschooling (paying parents who teach at home) or parent/teacher coops.
2. Personalized student evaluation and follow up: health, nutrition, IQ, exam results, etc. Vaccination status is non of the school’s business: if vaccines work, then those vaccinated shouldn't worry about the unvaxxed, right?
3. Live-streaming cameras in every class, automatically recorded and opened to every parent and the school supervision and director. Also in sport grounds.
4. Open process to remove bad teachers run by parents.
5. Zero homework (class time for self-work), keeping the possibility to go faster/deeper by self-learning at home, e.g. practice, book-reading or with online courses/AI.
6. Ranked objective grades (max competition):
• Standardize exams.
• Anonymize the exams for correction (100% merit).
• Teachers get to grade random students from classes, not their own.
• Normalize grades (Gauss-curve/normal distribution) above passing-grade, for each grading-teacher (removes the bias of stingy/generous teachers).
• Appeal process: automatic blind correction by another random teacher.
• Publish the grades per teacher and schools.
7. Micro-credit standardized system, where with teachers and school advice, parents or college students) decide which subjects they want, the pace (slow/fast-track) and depth (high, medium, low), building a personalized education with core competences (math, logic, language/s, fast-reading, creative thinking, etc.), core fields (humanities, science&tech, biology/medicine, arts, sports, philosophy/ethics/religion). Special needs track. No sex ed (that’s a parental responsibility). No room for ideology (unscientific safe-sex, gender ideology, climate change/action, etc.).
WARNING:
Is Vivek just another WEF-puppetician in politics?
https://scientificprogress.substack.com/p/the-real-vivek-ramaswampy
Don't be gullible! We need to be suspicious of anything coming from masons: good ideas have been weaponized before even mentioning them in public!
President John Quincy Adams: “Masonry ought forever to be abolished. It is wrong - essentially wrong - a seed of evil, which can never produce any good.”
Satanic Secret Societies for dummies:
https://scientificprogress.substack.com/p/sss-for-dummies
Who are The Powers That SHOULDN'T Be ?
https://scientificprogress.substack.com/p/criminal-intent
https://www.coreysdigs.com/global/who-is-they/
The end of money and freedom
https://scientificprogress.substack.com/p/uncle-sam-altman
LBJ killed JFK
https://scientificprogress.substack.com/p/lbj-killed-jfk
Weaponization of Justice: no democracy with Freemasonry!
https://scientificprogress.substack.com/p/weaponization-of-justice
Illuminati David Rockefeller, finest quotes:
https://scientificprogress.substack.com/p/david-rockefeller-illuminati
Confessions of ex illuminati Ronald Bernard:
https://scientificprogress.substack.com/p/confessions-of-illuminati-ronald
Illuminati Attali, finest quotes:
https://scientificprogress.substack.com/p/attali-illuminati-finest-quotes
Chisholm, father of the WHO’s global pedophilia
https://scientificprogress.substack.com/p/brock-chisholm-father-of-the-whos
Ex mason Serge Abad-Gallardo:
https://www.ncregister.com/interview/confessions-of-a-former-freemason-officer-converted-to-catholicism
16 laws we need to exit Prison Planet
https://scientificprogress.substack.com/p/laws-to-exit-planet-prison
Please share, not the articles, but the information! I'm expendable. Saving the free world, is not!
Thank you for your wealth of info and comments. Having Knowledge is the 1st step, Applying that Knowledge is the 2nd step, Multiplication from those steps is how a society can improve, If individuals so choose ….
I would advise Concentration on the positive of educational change as a Priority.
Attacking the negative is like stopping the fire engine on the way to the fire, to shoo the barking dogs away from chasing the fire truck. Put Out The Fire, First.
All the best, I will repost.
That does make sense what you are mentioning here! But of course your going to have parents who do not take an active role in their child’s education (as my mother is a great example of that, I had no guidance growing up) but as for my daughter I had started with her when she was 3 years old when I had her captive in the car, instead of handing her something distracting as I drove her to daycare (which I was not happy about but fortunately, I had a couple jobs that allowed me to participate in her school classroom extra curricular activities) I started teaching her, her address and phone number….just in case anything were to happen to her, ya just never know. The teachers were amazed at this because she was ahead of the other children in this area when she started school. Then when she came home from school I was working with her on her abc’s and spelling!
I also got her involved in volunteering and getting involved with our community!
This helped her tremendously when she got into college with having volunteered!
She is now (29 yrs of age) a very successful and smart young woman, because of the guidance I gave her!
But unfortunately, we haven’t spoken for almost 4 years due to a ridiculous disagreement that she is holding against me!
You almost homeschooled... I wonder whether that disagreement would have dissolved much sooner, as homeschoolers with their wider view of life, tend to have much better relationships with siblings and parents... ttyl
Where did I say I homeschooled in my comment! My comment was about being an active parent in my child’s education, unlike the majority of parents who literally drop off their children and leave their education up to the “system”!
So sorry to hear that and you worked so hard on her education. Somehow you need to ment the fence. Sometimes parents have to give in even if you don’t agree. Just agree to others her and keep your thoughts to yourself. Try to mend the fence mom. The indifference has kept you apart for 4 years? You have a plate of pancakes, when you eat them all you have nothing left. Life is short enough without those pancakes. God bless!
Believe me, I have tried to mend the fence. I have left messages when I call her but am ignored! Unfortunately, there is nothing I can do when your completely ignored! She made that choice, not me
I pulled my son out of public school and he started at a small Christian learning center as a freshman. He receives his core classes there and we take care of his extracurricular classes. It’s one of the best decision decisions we’ve made. He’s home more, experiences less stress from negative peer influences and the weird DEI/social justice movements in public school. His grades and learning are exponentially better and he’s happy.
Maybe you should heed your own advice...who ever said Vivek is trying to reinvent the wheel in an afternoon...those are your words! So dismissive are we? Apparently you take this personally....I've also been CEO/CFO and also professor in MBA grad school. This can be figured out...merit and results some hybrid...we all know the current system is not working...and gentle tweaks is not the answer. Buggy whips are gone. PLUS the current system is corrupted by leftists marxists idealogy. Anybody with an objective brain knows that public schools and some teachers have lost their way over the last 50 years...about the same time the DOE and marxism grew...hmm...study that...hmm...is there a correlation???
What do you think of this ideas to reinvent the education system?
https://open.substack.com/pub/vigilantfox/p/vivek-ramaswamy-drops-game-changing?r=tzxc5&utm_campaign=comment-list-share-cta&utm_medium=web&comments=true&commentId=102317010
I agree David. Teaching is not quite like running a business. Vivek probably needs to let people handle this issue that understand this issue. Maybe Administrators should do their job and cull teachers that don’t cut it before they are tenured. Not that I believe in tenure, but that is how the system works. Or, maybe a new teacher actually should work with an older teacher for a full year before being given a class. New teacher might have more confidence, especially in the area of discipline, if she/he had more time to gain knowledge.
Teaching is like not like buying or selling. It is not like war. It is more like parenting. A teacher can be good on one day in one school with one group of students and bad on another in another with another group. Severus Snape was often a bully, sometimes unjust, sometimes even cruel but he sacrificed himself to save the world. Was he a bad teacher? I think he is a portrayal of a Great teacher. If the enthusiastic likes of our Vivek had their way - judging by the above described merit system - Snape would have been kicked from the towers of Hogwarts never to save the world or educate anybody, let alone Harry Potter. It is as hard to say what a good teacher is as it is to say what a good wife or husband or friend or lover is. These things cannot be reduced to numbers. Vivek is well intentioned, of course, and he is whippet smart, no doubt, but teaching is first a vocation, we are born to it, and merit and performance charts and pay by results are, for me, not the best way to improve things - and he is right, they do need improving. If I were President I would do one thing. Just one. Treble teachers pay.
As a middle school teacher, I might disagree with you that teaching kids this age is not like war. I’ve never fought in a war, but at the very least I have to imagine it’s a close 2nd.
“Leaving teaching to teachers” IS a major part of the problem but not the whole problem. Lack of parenting and grandparenting is a big part of the problem as well. An ignorant nation is an opportunity for a totalitarian nation.
Yeah well I can think back to both teachers and professors that should NOT have been there, they were not ab asset to the profession and definitely NOT students but merely a job to slide thru on, yet great teachers that really mm ade tbe difference should be a knowledged and rewarded while losers should do somethingbelse = same for LEO's or any public servant that is NOT up for, good at or a problem...!
WRONG... when a teacher is genuinely an expert in their subject, AND that subject is genuinely producing life-skills, then customization to individual students' desires to learn that skill leads to every student/parent seeing benefit....
So ask those homeschoolers who dumped the whole schooling and outperform the schooled...
Vivek's CEOing is registering the shortfall in the stinking school system and ready to roll up his sleeves... ttyl
Just because a teacher is "genuinely an expert in their subject" doesn't mean they can teach. So much depends on HOW a teacher teachs and relates to students.
The devil is in the details. Merit and performance based on what? Do we throw out the outliers in the student and parent surveys? My peers hardly ever saw me in the classroom - so what do they know about my teaching? Do we measure results by pre and post test improvement so we aren't just rewarding the teachers who inherit the best students? What kind of test do we give for courses like automotive or computer game development? Do teachers who spend the most time making the Principal look good get the highest ranking? Tough questions.
Lee is asking all the right questions.
New York tried this (and failed) with its APPR boondoggle: Millions of dollars and man hours wasted assembling "Annual Professional Performance Reviews".
It was gamed. It got lawsuits. New York lost bad and just recently (and quietly) abandoned the whole program.
APPR featured "SLOs" (student learning outcomes) and HEDI Scores
Highly Effective
Effective
Developing
Insufficient
It was a disaster. Talented teachers were having nervous attacks. The incompetent ones could have cared less.
Answers here: https://open.substack.com/pub/vigilantfox/p/vivek-ramaswamy-drops-game-changing?r=tzxc5&utm_campaign=comment-list-share-cta&utm_medium=web&comments=true&commentId=102317010
Totally agree, the DEVIL is in the details, and the details extend far beyond the student, teacher, or school district. Parents- if they exist - and communities must be actively involved, and individual leaders ( teachers) need to be supported, their skill set made a priority. Merit pay?, a possible option, but please recognize that getting enhanced training and certificates is a merit pay system. Performance auditing? Well, we are seeing the effects of a severe lack of leadership and auditing of our government programs. Bottom line, these points of discussion go far beyond the school door - common sense, ethics, morals, standards, personal values and commitments are in the tank. Those will not be quickly, easily, or totally solved - IMHO.
Sorry no, it's a stupid idea that was tried and failed decades ago.
Steve Jobs suffered from similar failed thinking before he passed.
School shouldn't be a popularity contest, nor should it be a place where pushy parents on the PTA and school boards get special privileges for their children - yet all of this happens. Have watched it over 50 years in education.
Kids aren't uniform widgets, but human beings with different intelligences.
I've been "all in" on education, grades K-12, community college, undergraduate, graduate, have all the degrees through doctorate, multiple certifications, have been invited to every local, state, regional and national conferences to present papers, have taught internationally, been on advisory boards and president of my teaching organizations.
It's a cute idea but a bad one.
Your "all in" does not relate to student needs as much as it indicates yours and the bureaucractic need to enhance individual teacherl profiles - to what benefit - increased salary options? Obviously, the students have suffered under that game plan.
Thank you for responding.
My "all-in" garnered the second highest standardized test result in the state, missing the #1 spot by a single student's results.
That's an "on paper win" but the more important "wins" are intangible: I've had more students than I can count tell me I've saved their lives or changed them for the better: Kids getting off drugs, straightening out their lives, switching careers, finding religion, learning to think critically, etc. They've had me and my family in their homes for Thanksgiving, graduations, weddings and family events.
The home we live in is heated and cooled as a thank you from a former student for saving his sister's life.
Where I work tried merit pay before and it was an abject failure. It's impossible to account for the variables.
Read Lee's comments above. Lee sees the flaws in the suggestion.
Take care
Your stated results speak more towards your individual value sets and ability to apply the supplemental learned skills/knowledge than any papered degrees you've received. I applaud that, not so much the wall plaques.
what are your thoughts for this completely new system? (not Vivek's)
https://open.substack.com/pub/vigilantfox/p/vivek-ramaswamy-drops-game-changing?r=tzxc5&utm_campaign=comment-list-share-cta&utm_medium=web&comments=true&commentId=102317010
You grant that kids aren't widgets, and claim to have walked the walk, yet I hear no advocacy for SCHOOL CHOICE as the solution for ALL PARENTS to be heard, and ALL STUDENTs to have their individual learning styles served... and Teachers with dedication to those learning styles or whatever would find rewarding work and a chance for appropriate recognition....
MAYBE Vivek would recognize SCHOOL CHOICE as the driver needed...
Expanding it with some ideas from EdChoice and The Buckeye Institute or online homeschooling groups for feedback... TTYL
I'm not against many of Trump's radical actions, but as a former teacher I cannot get on board with this. There are WAY too many variables in classrooms and schools. I challenge anyone to spend a week as a teacher in an average classroom and think that money alone will inspire a teacher to be "great". In some schools, folks would say "there is not enough money in the world to make me want to stay here". and yet so many GOOD teachers do. because it's not about the money. It's about the kids.
Our parents are distracted and stressed. Our homes are broken. Our communities are struggling. And kids reflect all of that. Each child brings that struggle into a classroom. A teacher gets to accommodate for 30 -100+ students with their own struggles every day. Oh, and teach them information that is sometimes relevant to their lives. "Merit" is a joke. Most teachers I know work their asses off and don't need an additional measure of someone elses idea of "merit" added to their job. Schools are not businesses. Our children are not products on an assembly line. That thinking is what causes so much problem in schools already.
This was well stated. You hit the nail on the head. Too many nuances in young human beings for a blanket program they will run into the ground like they do with everything. Humans are not commodities, but the government thinks we are!
I'd appreciate your input on this:
https://open.substack.com/pub/vigilantfox/p/vivek-ramaswamy-drops-game-changing?r=tzxc5&utm_campaign=comment-list-share-cta&utm_medium=web&comments=true&commentId=102317010
You have said it much better than I did. Thank you.
"Our parents are distracted and stressed. Our homes are broken. Our communities are struggling. And kids reflect all of that." THIS is the problem going back about 30 years. The book "It Takes a Village" and Hilary Clinton's messing in the US educational system is what began the downslide in the 1990's. Most people forget that since we are so distant from it now with our 24/7 news cycles to make people forget anything that isn't in front of their face for that moment.
Sports is the god for most families now and those families are often single mother households. But that was the goal started in the 1990's to take down America from within and the destruction of the family to achieve that goal. How has that worked for us now?
Right on spot! the goal was to destroy the family, because it takes a family to raise a real man, not a village!
I'd appreciate your input on this:
https://open.substack.com/pub/vigilantfox/p/vivek-ramaswamy-drops-game-changing?r=tzxc5&utm_campaign=comment-list-share-cta&utm_medium=web&comments=true&commentId=102317010
So long as funding is tied to actual performance and not the number of kids to "pass", I agree. But it will depend on the definition of "performance." Funding is the reason we are in this terrible mess to begin with. The more kids that "pass," the more money the school district receives. My mother is a retired high school teacher of 30 years, and they are actively told to pass kids regardless of actual performance because that is how "performance" is evaluated, and frankly because of the outrage and pushback from parents if they are held back; school districts don't want to deal with unruly kids who refuse to pay attention and do nothing but watch TikTok while in class (because taking their phones is seen as a violation of their rights(!)), and further, because the funding they do receive goes towards admin. salaries, NOT decreasing class sizes, providing teachers with better pay, or the supplies/resources they need. It's all a grift, and I worry that it will continue to be the same if money is the reward.
Spot on.
Teachers who get the better track of students (the ones in band, or scheduled for honors / AP / IB programs) will look like superheroes while the others who get unruly kids, especially after meds have worn off, after being plied with GMO and corn-syrup laden lunch will look like failures.
This idea is so poorly thought out I wonder how much time Vivek spent on the other side of the podium teaching in a public school.
Here's a solution, thoughts?
https://open.substack.com/pub/vigilantfox/p/vivek-ramaswamy-drops-game-changing?r=tzxc5&utm_campaign=comment-list-share-cta&utm_medium=web&comments=true&commentId=102317010
I agree with "performance" and defining it correctly is a huge issue - performance is a demonstrable skill set and not just passing kids for administrative metrics. This county's kids have paid the price.
My spouse is an early retired chemistry professor (mandates - but that's a different story). Over the decades, students arriving at the university - small jesuit liberal arts school, great scholastic reputation - cannot perform simple math required, can't think critically, can't reason out if the answer the calculator spits out makes any sense, etc. Not only can these kids not do math and don't comprehend basic mathematical concepts, they have to be taught how to use their calculators - in college - not exaggerating. The students entering this school are generally kids with high high school gpa's. Many of these kids because of math issues leave chemistry as a major and default to majoring in biology due to less math and they think they'll have a better gpa to get into med school (could explain a few things there!). Students also have expectations that even though they're literally failing a chem class that they'll be automatically passed somehow. Nope. My spouse spent many office hours (and more) doing everything possible to help these kids. Some made it, some didn't. Also loads of hours counseling students about what to pursue next based on their interests.
I graduated from this school in the 80's with a chemistry degree. We all came in with math skills and the ability to think and problem solve. In grad school I taught the most basic chem class - the one for students who had weak math backgrounds who could get some more exposure before taking the standard chem class - shocked at how these kids were representative of my spouse's students.
There is no fair way to do it. The teacher who is assigned highly motivated students gets rewarded while the teacher who struggles with a recalcitrant student gets nothing even though they have the more difficult job. High stakes testing is not the answer. It will only lead to cheating. I don’t think Vivek can come up with a fair evaluation that doesn’t promote cheating.
The only way this will work is to let teachers actually teach. Stop controlling how they teach in their classrooms. Give teachers the ability to create a stimulating way of presenting the material instead of forcing them to teach to the standardized tests. They have to be given a chance to be creative with their lesson plans so it holds the student’s attention. This is where much of the breakdown in classrooms is coming from. Teachers are largely just reading curriculum from books. Children pick up on that lack of preparation & get bored. They turn off & become a discipline problem. Teachers need the freedom to get back to teaching the basics. I think K-7th grade should leave computer technology out of classrooms. Leave computers for high school & just let teachers focus on the basics. Kids need this foundation first.
Absolutely agree. No technology for young children! It’s dangerous for them to be that close to it. Children need to learn how to socialize and think logically for themselves first. No cell phones at school either. How can teachers teach with all those distractions? In our county, every kid gets a Chromebook in 1st grade. Why? Let kids be kids. They pick up on that stuff so quickly, they won’t be behind in technology if it waits until high school.
I'd love your comment on this:
https://open.substack.com/pub/vigilantfox/p/vivek-ramaswamy-drops-game-changing?r=tzxc5&utm_campaign=comment-list-share-cta&utm_medium=web&comments=true&commentId=102317010
I think we’ve seen what happens when teachers determine curriculum for themselves. They turn into activist teachers, teaching what they care about - preparing their students for a new world. One with safe spaces, participation trophies and “inclusivity”. And our students get dumber and dumber.
Good point, however, I think that is the built-in indoctrination coming from NGO’s & government. It’s the DEI stuff we don’t want for kids. The freedom to teach I’m talking about is where the good teachers honestly & earnestly plan their lessons so the kids actively learn & participate in their learning. A more nuanced comprehensive approach that incorporates whole body activities (ie:marching while doing math exercises, or working in small groups). The great teachers leave out of frustration with being pigeonholed to teach to the test. Those standardized test scores have to be high. So they make sure the kids know the answers they’ll see on the test. There’s no time left for true heart centered learning. Where kids move forward to the next grade always having a reverence for that awesome teacher who made a difference in their life. Kids desperately need that these days. They need awesome, kind, loving, encouraging, devoted teachers who truly care about their future & their educational success. DEI hires don’t truly care about these things. They have nefarious intentions to indoctrinate their ideology onto impressionable minds. That is very different from what I’m talking about. Thanks for pointing this out though. The DEI shit has to stop. Have a great day!
I always made a living as a tutor and worked at Stanley Kaplan tutoring MCAT, LSAT, GMAT and GRE examinations. Some people have a knack for teaching whole other people don’t. W. Manion, MDPHDJDMBA
Some people have a knack for teaching while other people don’t. W. Manion, MDPHDJDMBA
In Spanish they say:
<< El profesor nace, no se hace. >>
The teacher is born, not made.
I did not know that Spanish statement but now that you made that statement I would tend to agree with you. I have had teachers in Law School, Medical School, Graduate School, Business School, College, etc. The best teachers can simplify concepts, identify what you should learn, and give you memory aids or mnemonics to help you remember important concepts. Thank you for your great comment. W. Manion, MDPHDJDMBA
No. You want to build a team with good teaching and learning ethics. Merit pay is never truly meritorious in education because the intangibles just don't get measured. Instead you get favoritism, cheating, bias, shunning, resentment and a disintegrating learning environment. Better to have a good, fixed salary schedule with plenty of peer evaluation and regular cross-classroom visits.
Teachers today are given classes filled with a mix of children. Several that do not speak english, several that have been diagnosed with ADD, several that are brilliant, and a host of other issues. Classes need to be re-structured so that the children are placed in groups where they can learn
Vivek has a great idea! Merit based.. yes sir.. If our society had it's act together, teachers would be among the highest paid.. not professional athletes..
Not just yes. Hell yes!