A New York Times editorial last week came very close to getting it right on teachers, teacher hiring, teacher retention, and teacher pay.
To maintain its standing as an economic power, the United States must encourage programs that help students achieve the highest levels in math and science, especially in poor communities where the teacher corps is typically weak.
The National Academies, the country’s leading science advisory group, has called for an ambitious program to retrain current teachers in these disciplines and attract 10,000 new ones each year for the foreseeable future. These are worthy goals. But a new study from a federal research center based at the Urban Institute in Washington suggests that the country might raise student performance through programs like Teach for America, a nonprofit group that places high-achieving college graduates in schools that are hard to staff.
Recruiting high-achievers, across the board and not just with the help of a flagship do-gooder program, will require that starting salaries be competitive with those jobs where people of high caliber flock. Education competes with accounting, law, medicine and other high-paying professions for the best people.
If Milton Friedman and Adam Smith were right, that most people act rather rationally in their own interests, economically, which jobs will get the best people?
Teaching is the only profession I can think of where the administrators and other leaders threaten to fire the current teachers, work to keep working conditions low and unsatisfactory, and say that more money will come only after championship performance.
There isn’t a person alive who hasn’t cursed George Steinbrenner and said that he or she could run the Yankees better. Whenever he opens his checkbook, the nation howls. And yet, year in an year out, the Yankees win.
Is there any fool alive who thinks Steinbrenner could do what he does by cutting pay, not cleaning the locker room, and drafting the cheapest players he could find? Were we to assume Steinbrenner the world’s most famous lousy boss, there are a million education administrators who would need to step it up to get to Steinbrenner’s level.
As Utah Phillips famously said, graduates are about to be told they are the nation’s greatest natural resource — but have you seen how this nation treats its natural resources?
Oh, I miss Molly Ivins.
Millard Fillmore's Bathtub 
Just found this, TEDtalks has a prize for people involved in schools.
http://onceuponaschool.org/?page_id=191
“The challenge
Design and implement a new and innovative project for local public school students. Collaborate with a dynamic teacher or school to determine the best use of your skills and passion. There are no limitations to what is possible.”
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It isn’t just a problem with the schools, the media does its part in dumbing down the public.
http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/view/id/248
“Why we know less than ever about the world”
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Sally Binford was an important scholar in archaeological anthropology. Unfortunately, her story in the profession (per the blog reference) wasn’t that unusual (except that she was better than average) and still isn’t to some degree. (then was known as two groups of archaeologists– the hairy-chinned and the hairy-chested ).
Lew was a blowhard. I once reviewed one of his papers and none of the data added up correctly in his tables. Even his map was wrong. And he was supposed to be THE guru. I knew another “guru”, with similar field qualities.
But academic anthropology is different from primary and secondary schooling, more pretentious? I wonder if the influence on others is different?
One reason I went into anthropology was because of my high school world history teacher (our final in that class was a two-week in advance question to be written during finals– “Account for the elevation of Hebrew thought” , essentially trace the origins of monotheism.)
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Amen! I am constantly consternated when people wonder how to get top-flight people to be teachers. How about paying teachers a salary that says “This is a crucially important job?”
But it’s the same situation for firefighters and paramedics. We know how crucially important those jobs are, and we know how little people in those jobs are paid.
For every person who understands how important teachers are, there seem to be 1,000 people who just want to say “Pay teachers more? They get the whole summer off!”
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Someone I am sure was a great teacher was anthropologist Sally Binford. This may be OT, but this article from Susie Bright’s Journal already has my vote for the best blog of the year. Younger people should really know this history.
http://susiebright.blogs.com/susie_brights_journal_/2008/05/sally-binford-n.html#more
It is rather long for a blog, but more than worth it. It tells so much about relatively recent American history.
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[…] our high school teachers, with some exceptions, are not the best and brightest we have to offer. Millard Fillmore’s bathtub explores some reasons that this is the case: Recruiting high-achievers, across the board and not just with […]
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