HELP needed with drafting an education plank for Democratic Party platform

Parent Cafe
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<p>I’m part of the education subcommittee of the local Democratic Party. We’re meeting again tomorrow.</p>

<p>One issue I’d like to address that my group hasn’t DIRECTLY addressed is the SSSLLLOOOWWW pace of the elementary school curriculum. My elementary school years were such a waste of time. More time was spent reviewing old material than moving on to new material. </p>

<p>Math reverted back to 2+2=4 every year up to 6th grade. I think I could have had algebra in 4th or 5th grade instead of 8th. Then there were the hours wasted on copying the definitions of spelling words and writing out spelling words 5 times each. English class was little more than repeating the same old punctuation and capitalization year after year. It’s quite an inducement to go on autopilot. The irony of all this is that education experts are always complaining that students are way behind on math and other subjects. Well, DUH! What do you expect when elementary school education is such a joke? If junior high and high school had continued at the agonizingly slow pace of elementary school, I’d probably still be in high school today (14 years after graduation).</p>

<p>I picked up a lot of unproductive ways of thinking that I have since had to overcome: expecting school to be easy, thinking I was entitled to A’s, shying away from challenges, and being more concerned in school with butt-covering than with actually learning.</p>

<p>These unproductive ways of thinking caught up to me as an undergraduate in college. Although my 4.13 cumulative GPA in UIUC electrical engineering (3.13 on the conventional 4-point scale) was well below my K-12 GPA, I’m now surprised I didn’t do a lot worse. So many factors worked against me: I realized that nobody owed me anything because of my past GPA, there’s so much work that you can’t maintain the perfect quality of K-12 work, and I just didn’t care anymore so long as I passed.</p>

<p>Thankfully, I’ve changed enormously in the past decade. But that’s a long story, and it’s not really relevant to this thread.</p>

<p>I’m trying to find a way to incorporate all this into a platform statement for the local Democratic Party. I know that things like better funding, more paid in-service days (for teachers to get the classroom ready, attend training, etc.), higher salaries, smaller class sizes, etc. would address the issue I brought up here. But I feel the need to come up with a platform plank that acknowledges my perspective more directly.</p>

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<p>Are you kidding - your list of things to put in the platform - “better funding, more paid in-service days for teachers, more training for teachers”. Typical Democrat response to problem - throw more money at it. Do you think our schools are actually better today than 40 years ago when there was no Federal funding? Did you see this - Stupid in America - the schools in most Democrat-run urban areas wouldn’t even let John Stossel into the classroom. Are you aware of the Florida Supreme Court(Democrat) ruling recently that struck down Charter Schools? Now a large number of African-American students who were able to flee their FAILED schools have to go back. Hmmm, I wonder what public schools Chelsea Clinton went to, or Al Sharpton’s kids, or Jesse Jackson’s kids, or Teddy Kennedy’s children. Answer: they didn’t.</p>

<p>I live in a town where the average teacher - working 9 months per year - makes over $70,000. Our schools stink. My daughter comes home and tells me how bad her classes are, what a waste of time they are. Hmmm, let’s pump more money in. My aunt, a teacher, was once WARNED by her fellow NJEA members/teachers, not to put in one minute past 4 p.m. helping students - it would make the rest of them look bad.</p>

<p>But please put “better funding” into your platform - if the platform is publicized enough the taxpayers might actually vote Republican.</p>

<p><a href=“John Stossel's 'Stupid in America' - ABC News”>http://www.abcnews.go.com/2020/Stossel/story?id=1500338&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

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<p>All you need to know about writing an education plank for the Democratic Parity can be summed up in two words:</p>

<p>Teachers Union</p>

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<p>Well, I’ll come at this from the opposite side:</p>

<p>Unions are good for the middle bunch of workers - the unexceptional but not poor. Unions are really good for lousy workers, because it’s hard as heck to fire someone in a union for performance-based issues. They are bad for the very best, who cannot be adequately rewarded for their efforts.</p>

<p>Don’t throw more money at it. Teachers can prep their classrooms all they want, but there are HUGE issues that go beyond whether or not the construction paper is in the right place. Here are some problems with trying to re-vamp K-6 education:
*Any one teacher is pretty inert. She has to (roughly) follow the other teachers in her grade. She is getting kids that were taught by other teachers in the grades below her, and her kids are going to be all mixed up in the grade above her. Example: if the teachers in 5th grade teach long division, why teach it in fourth grade?
*Unions make it hard to reward good teachers.
*It’s easy for even the best teachers to keep using the same curriculum over and over again, instead of updating it to further push kids as she becomes more effective at communicating information.
*The supply of cheap labour has diminished as women have found other careers. Used to be that smart, energetic women would teach - and there wasn’t much room to negotiate salary. Now those women are doing other stuff, leaving, by in large, the less-talented people to teach - the people who probably weren’t too keen on being pushed very hard in elementary school. Why would they push their students?
*It’s politically incorrect to separate kids out by ability.
*Everyone wants to measure changes by having kids take standardized tests.</p>

<p>Want to run an educational platform, for either party? Address the above. Get a group of similarly-minded teachers together - and get them from all grades. Have them discuss with each other and redesign the entire curriculum from scratch. Have them get creative. Work on a more project-based approach (when needed - the mechanics of math, spelling, and grammar are still essential), which stimulates thinking. Require that children go out and do their independent projects, write up results, analyze data, etc. </p>

<p>Incorporate after-school programmes into the schools. Designate time in each week when kids will have to do the type of projects that you’ll find in after-school enrichments. </p>

<p>Finally, if you have it, get rid of New Math/Chicago Math. It’s horrible.</p>

<p>You can all probably guess that I’m not a Democrat. :p</p>

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<p>It doesn’t matter if unions are good or not.</p>

<p>The Democrats are as beholden to the teachers unions as the Republicans are to Jerry Falwell’s congregation.</p>

<p>Just good ol’ fashioned politics. It’s all about the benjies.</p>

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<p>“*Unions make it hard to reward good teachers.”</p>

<p>I am a good teacher, in fact many of my students and their parents have gone so far as to call me outstanding. In my twenty years in the classroom I have had the privilege to work with several other very good, dedicated teachers. </p>

<p>I have said in other posts that I agree there are incompetent teachers out there. Just as there are people in all professions who are incompetent. In my opinion there is no reason for anyone to defend incompetent teachers beyond making sure they have been given due process. </p>

<p>At the same time I will tell you that I have worked for and seen many other principals, supervisors and superintendents who would abuse their staffs in a heartbeat if we didn’t have contracts and unions to protect us.</p>

<p>My question is this. What would you base merit pay on for people in her subject area on? Do you limit merit pay to teachers in core academic subjects? How do you measure what is deserving of extra pay? Do you use test scores to determine who gets higher pay? Test scores will vary from year to year based upon a variety of factors.</p>

<p>Experience also plays a critical role. Do you hold a first-year teacher up to the same criteria for merit pay as a twenty-year veteran?</p>

<p>Also someone, pointed out that a teacher in their area of New Jersey earns $70,000 per year. What is the cost of housing where you live? It seems to me based upon my admittedly limited knowledge of New Jersey that houses are extremely expensive. If that is the case, how can a salary that enables a teacher to earn enough to afford to live be unreasonable?</p>

<p>I teach in Maryland. Maryland is the 4th wealthiest state in the nation. We have the worst retirement system in the United States. A teacher in Maryland will get 38% of the average of their highest three years. In my case if I were eligible to retire today that would be $19,000 per year. Support staff get only 20% of the average of their highest three years. A teacher in Maryland after 30 years in the classroom cannot retire with any sort of dignity if their sole source of income is the Maryland retirement system. Currently Maryland has a 1.2 billion dollar surplus in its’ budget yet both the Governor and the General Assembly claim they cannot afford to improve retirement benefits for educators.</p>

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<p>As a former public school teacher (8 years) in the wealthy suburbs of Chicago, where salaries now peak over 100K, I can tell you that there are plenty of inept, unmotivated, educational professionals in the good schools. Parents (like most of those in these forums) care so much for their children that they’re willing to spend a fortune in taxes. The overgrown, mega schools are just showplaces for the future WIZ KID generation. The reality unfortunately is that there will always be a small percentage of these kids and they will come from loving caring families who make certain that the education they recieve is approprite no matter where they learn. I have no problem with teachers (or any other profession) trying to receive the maximum dollar for their efforts (no matter how good or bad they may be). As with all of our society, you must be willing to make the adjustment necessary, if you feel you’re not getting the services you’ve paid for. Most of American society has come to EXPECT certain things. And when the results don’t meet the expectations they do little or nothing about it (besides complain). I left education for a variety of reasons. Primarily, because I couldn’t see myself doing the same thing (most educational topics don’t change very often) for the next 20 years. And while the method of disemmination differs periodically based on the technology available, the reward (monetarily or professionally) simply was not outweighed by the tedium. Personally, I don’t think most teachers EARN the wage they receive. There are plenty of great teachers. Teachers CAN and DO have an incredible impact (both good and bad) on our youth. It is for this WISH, or HOPE that most Americans are willing to get TAXED to death. I don’t have the answers. I don’t blame the people, I don’t blame the teachers, but MONEY is NOT the answer. My kids received a comparable education in a relatively rural location for 1/3rd of the tax of the Chicago "burbs, and the 1st of 2 will be attending an IVY, EA…class of 2010 >>>>>>It’s NOT about the money<<<<<< People need to ACT upon their displeasure with the system. In our democratic society you have the ability to elect people who represent YOU yet only a fraction of Americans vote. You have the freedom to MOVE away from the inept politicians and teachers who affect your lifestyle. YES there is a tradeoff… Job prospects, cost of transportation, availability of shopping malls, movie theatres, and other “entertainment” are exchanged for a system you believe in at a cost you can afford. Now as a school board member I can have a direct affect on the education my children get. ACTION ! ! ! If you don’t like what you have, don’t expect others to change it for you. If you do, you’re as guilty as those who impose the plan for the masses on you and your kids. (sorry soap box)</p>

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<p>Wharfrat:</p>

<p>Here are my observations based on my knowledge of having a sister teaching in a public school, a brother-in-law teaching in a private Christian school, a fiance teaching in an inner-city public school and her daughter teaching in an expensive private school:</p>

<p>On unions - they reward mediocrity, make ineptitude acceptable and punish excellence. My fiance just started with her school last Sept. and has made extraordinary progress in improving the writing skills of her students (I have seen the difference between their “what I did during summer vacation” papers and “what winter means to me papers” - it was night and day. Her administration has given her glowing reviews. Yet, the president of the union (a fellow teacher) derides her in front of her peers as a “brown noser”. In other words - she is demonstrating that improvement is possible and it is obvious that the other teachers are just not doing their job, and he doesn’t appreciate that. On the other hand, for years he has been using the union to prevent another, drug-addicted teacher who misses at least one day a week from being fired. </p>

<p>On merit pay: private industry has dealt with pay for performance forever. Is the performance quantifiable so that the rewards can be awarded based on a strict algorithm - rarely. Is there a certain element of cronyism and unfairness involved - almost certainly. But, on the grand scheme of things it does work and the best people tend to be the best rewarded and the worst people tend to be the ones with the lowest reward and are the ones most likely to be let go when times get tough. A teacher who is good already or who knows they have the capacity to be good if they were properly rewarded for their effort should welcome merit pay. The fact that they fight it sends a signal that perhaps they really don’t want to expend the effort.</p>

<p>Pay scales: Both my BIL and future step daughter teach in private schools at different ends of the economic spectrum (his students are primarily lower-to-middle middle class, hers are upper-middle class to VERY rich. Both systems pay their teachers much lower than what the comparable public school teacher earns. Yet, both systems routinely send almost all of their graduates to college and quite often to top schools. </p>

<p>Retirement pay: I only wish that my retirement pay/pension would pay me 38% of my highest years. And, unlike a teacher’s pension which is tied to inflation, a private pension generally is fixed and dwindles in purchasing power each year. We have friends who have retired as teachers in NJ and their retirement pay is much more that I would get from a private pension - plus they don’t worry that the employer will go bankrupt and have the entire pension pulled out from them (a very real concern in private industry today).</p>

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<p><a href=“http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/28/education/28tests.html?_r=2&th=&emc=th&pagewanted=print&oref=login[/url]”>http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/28/education/28tests.html?_r=2&th=&emc=th&pagewanted=print&oref=login&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>So much for better results from private and charter schools. As already noted, Stoessel didn’t bother to even look at the 9 of the so-called top 10 countries in education that don’t have school choice, vouchers, or charters. Maybe he can do a second show.</p>

<p>If public schools with unions, no merit pay, etc. do as well or better than private or charter schools which are not “impeded” by them, do we want to ask what private and charter schools are doing wrong, or what public schools are doing right? Why is it that this private, market-driven, competitive, performance-oriented education system can’t deliver the goods?</p>

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<p>Look to where parents are satisfied with how their money is spent
[does competition make schools better?](<a href=“http://www.edreform.com/index.cfm?fuseAction=section&pSectionID=2&cSectionID=74”>www.edreform.com/index.cfm?fuseAction=section&pSectionID=2&cSectionID=74</a>)</p>

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<p>I just went to the author’s website of the Charter/Public School report - here’s a statement in their synopsis - “Third, fourth graders in charter schools scored below public school students, but eighth graders in charter schools scored above public school students.” Now I’m not a statistician but I know that 1) statistics can be used to support virtually any side of any issue - I’d want to see the peer review of this report and 2) the assumption I would make from the statement above is this - fourth grade charter school students move to charter schools from the WORST public schools, initiatlly their scores will be lower. Four years later, after spending time in a charter school, their scores have overtaken that of the average public school. Makes sense.</p>

<p>And, Mini - I see from your website and writings that you are an expert on homeschooling and homeschooled your children. I admire that - and it certainly doesn’t reach the level of hypocrisy of the Clintons or Kennedys or Sharpton’s who vote against Charter Schools but send their children to private schools. It does, however, call into question your support of public schools in your post. I’d sincerely be interested in why you homeschooled and what benefits your children have gained from homeschooling. Would they have been worse off in a public school? Not everyone can afford to home school (loss of one parent’s income) but they can afford private or charter schools. You have the luxury of homeschooling - why take away people’s right to send their children to Charter schools that aren’t controlled by the NEA?</p>

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<p>I have spoken to friends and aquaintances who live in the Olympia area ( inc those who have been high up in both the Clinton and Locke administrations) and they send their kids to Olympias public schools and are pretty happy with them. Of course teh parents I know all work outside of the house, and they just would not be able to invest the time and energy into educating their child as well as raising them.
I find homeschooling interesting, but doesn’t suit either my nor my childs temprament, however I am all for more options, including homeschooling but others as well.</p>

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<p>emeraldkity4 - thanks for the link - I just had time to skim the descriptions of the reports but it sounds like virtually all support the positive impact of charter schools, not only on students but on making the public schools better. And all were written by reputable academics. Interesting that the NY Times article wouldn’t reference any other studies, including these, for their readers - but par for the course since the Times in the past two years has become the unofficial voice of the Democrats, or maybe Hillary. A real shame - since I was in 4th grade I was able to read the Times, appreciate their viewpoint and still feel I was still getting near-balanced news. It was bad enough that they came out against Alito - they followed up with an editorial endorsing a filibuster. For every five letters to the editor supporting the Times left-wing position, they publish one or none in rebuttal.</p>

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<p>Not to completely bash Mini’s article… but it doesn’t prove anything. They only used math scores. Great. Fabulous. Perhaps private and charter schools put more emphasis on reading. Perhaps they are more widely accessed in different parts of the country.</p>

<p>As for homeschooling - usually geographic. I know that a lot of military personnel like to try to homeschool, which gives their kids continuity as the family moves. A lot of people homeschool when the public schools are so dismal that they aren’t a good option. Not many Massachusetts suburban families homeschool, that’s for sure.</p>

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<p>“It does, however, call into question your support of public schools in your post.”</p>

<p>I have written about homeschooling in other forums, so I don’t think I need to repeat what I’ve previously said. And, for the record, despite very serious misgivings, I support charter schools, vouchers, private schools, religious schools, homeschooling, traveling school, and every possible kind of option you can imagine (and have had experience with all of them - we had lots of quasi-foster kids in virtually every one of these environments) - because kids simply don’t have time to wait for “things to get better”.</p>

<p>(The charter school 8th grade numbers simply reflect the fact that special ed. kids, at whatever income level, had no other place to go…and I wish they did. There are two other studies of charter schools funded by the Bush Adminstration that came to the same conclusion. The real question is why all those unfettered schools don’t yield hugely better results, regardless, and at all levels.)</p>

<p>BUT, at the same time, knowing that those options - options that are available to kids who have parents with the time, energy, money, know-how, and education to make better choices – I support higher, and I mean MUCH higher – spending on public schools. (And there has never been a school bond issue I haven’t voted for.) The rich know how much it costs to educate a child well. You can go to the Phillips Exeter website, and after you get past the Harkness Tables, (a maximum of 11 students per class per subject, IF there are no children with special needs), it costs roughly $30k a year, provided the parents can provide a rich and varied and caring homelife. $30k each year, every year, if there are no children with special needs, and no difficult problems at home to mitigate. I don’t believe this level of funding would solve the problems of schools. I also don’t believe solutions on a mass scale would be found without it. The wealthy have demonstrated what it takes, and I think we should assume they know. (This, by the way, is basically what it costs the average homeschooling family, when you count the foregone income of the caretaking parent.) The experiment I would like to see would be for the Exeter folks to be given $30k a year per child, plus a substantial campus and endowment in East L.A., for the next 3 generations, and see what they could produce.</p>

<p>“Not many Massachusetts suburban families homeschool, that’s for sure.”</p>

<p>I am speaking in Acton, Massachusetts next Thursday, and expect a very large turnout of Massachusetts suburban families, as I always have had when I speak in Massachusetts. The number of suburban Massachusetts families who homeschool is huge, and growing rapidly. At the end of February, I am speaking in San Francisco, Los Gatos, and Davis, and expect a big turnout of suburban families. In the coming months, I am already booked for Portland, Oregon, Vancouver BC, Minneapolis-St. Paul, suburban Connecticut, and Woodinville, Washington, all place where I expect - from previous experience – very substantial turnouts.</p>

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<p>Mini, the federal government spent on average $20,000 for each household in 2005. This is a record. So much for smaller government under the republicans.</p>

<p>I know most of the education money is spent by local and state governments. Still, I don’t see how we are going to be able to afford an Exeter type education for the masses. It costs big bucks.</p>

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<p>“Still, I don’t see how we are going to be able to afford an Exeter type education for the masses. It costs big bucks.”</p>

<p>Well, it’s a matter of choices. We can afford a couple of trillion in Iraq, after all. I could go into a long harangue about how the corporate socialists would not want to see an Exeter-quality education for folks even if we could afford it, but I won’t. All I am willing to note is that we know how much the rich think an adequate education costs, and homeschoolers have essentially come to the same conclusion.</p>

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<p>My suggestion: cut down to time by 50% in elementary school for social studies, PE art, music and science. Devote that time on 3 Rs.</p>

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<p>“My suggestion: cut down to time by 50% in elementary school for social studies, PE art, music and science. Devote that time on 3 Rs.”</p>

<p>My own .02 worth. Most elementary schools in our area already spend a frighteningly small amount of time on Social Studies as it is. To cut this time by 50% would render Social Studies completely meaningless in our elementary schools. As a high school Social Studies teacher and Department Chair I will admit to a certain amount of bias on this subject.</p>

<p>In addition, how can we further diminish the importance of P.E. art, music, and science? All are extremely important to the physical, emotional and intellectual development of our children whether elementary or secondary.</p>

<p>A dedicated and diligent teacher will find ways to incorporate the teaching of the “3 R’s” into other subject matter i.e. Social Studies and Science. I know in my classroom I am constantly looking for ways to include the reinforcement of reading and math skills into my lessons.</p>

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<p>wharfrat2: I disagree. I believe that if a frst grader is falling behind in those 3 R, he/she will most likely stay behind (I know about those ‘extra’ tutoring). In this country ‘holding back’ a child is a mortal sin. In higher grades who has not even msatered the watered down curriculum in 3Rs subject, would never learn to appreciate SS, arts, music or science.</p>

<p>My wife is substituing and she is amazed when 3rd graders tell her that they can’t solve the math word problems, because they can’t read. 3rd graders have trouble doing one-digit mutiplications, but the curriculum requires that they know about areas and perimeters (what happened to those mutiplication tables).</p>

<p>I do have problem with educators talking about ‘whole development’ or ‘whole language’. You can’t build a whole house if you have weak foundation. Whole house needs sheet rock, wood, nails, glass, plastic etc etc - the foundation needs only cement and steel !</p>