kitchen table math, the sequel: On the lighter side, sort of

Sunday, April 4, 2010

On the lighter side, sort of

Increasing Number of Parents Opting to Have Children School-Homed here.

I came across this rib tickler while reading a dismal report on my state legislature's continuing refusal to stand up to our teacher's union, Education Minnesota. The current issue is whether to permit alternative teacher certification.

Minnesota has one of the largest achievement gaps in the nation.

But here's a quote from the union president, from Politics in Minnesota:
“Why in the world, when we rightfully demand more from students, would we demand less of teachers?” Dooher wrote. “Minnesota is a national leader in teacher excellence. That’s why we’re speaking up against the Teach for America program, and why we believe parents should, too. This program, which has been around for years, puts people in charge of classrooms after only five weeks of training.”

Could he be more plain about protecting his turf? The bills in the legislature are about bringing qualified, experienced professionals into the profession. Reportedly, some include requirements such as having earned a bachelor degree with at least a 3.0 grade point average, or having at least 10 years of relevant experience in their subject matter, completion of a state-certified preparatory program, and passing all skills tests required of teachers before entering the classroom.

But nope, not acceptable to our teacher's union. Gotta get them when they're 23 and straight out of ed school, I guess, or you might end up with some disruptive influences.

8 comments:

Crimson Wife said...

A couple years ago, I looked into what it would take for me to get a CA teacher's credential for high school science. Bear in mind that I studied biology at Stanford undergrad and finished with a 3.8 GPA. I worked for the department as a tutor and several of the other tutors did TFA.

Of the 12 required courses to get my M.Ed. and credential from the local Cal State, only 3 were pedological. The remaining 9 were politically correct nonsense like "Multicultural Foundations of a Diverse Classroom".

True, California's government-run schools serve a diverse student population, but multiculturalism IMHO should be incorporated within subject specific methods. Maybe have future science teachers do a unit on famous minority scientists such as George Washington Carver, Nobel Laureate Luis Frederico Leloir, etc.

Anonymous said...

My grades 1-4 (we had no k) teachers were all normal school grads, given one year of teacher training post high school, and they were all excellent teachers.

Unlike almost any other major, aspiring ES-MS teachers SHOULD (but probably don't, due to their own k-12 education) already know the pertinent subject-area content for k-8 before they arrive at college. If ed schools can't teach them HOW TO TEACH these content areas EFFECTIVELY, including supervised practice, in four years, what the H*** are they doing and why shouldn't they be closed?

BTW, all of the PhDs who taught the sciences in my master's and doctoral programs would be considered unqualified to teach HS - none ever had any ed courses. The fact that they were practicing professionals in their fields counts for nothing. And ed schools whine about getting no respect!!

IMHO, multicultural ed is far more political indoctrination (horse apples!) than education. If someone's contribution to a field isn't inherently worthy of mention, their ethnic group or sex shouldn't make it so.

Anonymous said...

One of the odder situations you will find is that people who are not permitted to teach in high school (lack of credential, etc.) *ARE* permitted to teach the remedial courses to university freshmen. Since the remedial course is often just the high school material (and often is taken for no college credit), we have the amusing and sad situation that the people responsible for remediating are not permitted to teach the original class.

There seems to be something wrong with that ...

VickyS said...

And what about private and parochial schools? In my state, and I assume most others, you don't need state licensure to teach in a private schools. Are those teachers any less effective for it? Are those schools any worse for it? I think the answer to that is provided by parents who are willing to pay the big bucks for teaching by those substandard, non-licensed teachers.

Probably the reason that the success of private schools with their non-licensed teachers is not mentioned very often is that it would be an invitation to further regulate private schools. Public education being a state mandate, private schools exist because the state lets them exist, so they keep a low profile. Attracting attention, for example by weighing in on the teacher licensure issues, can only bring trouble.

VickyS said...

"Substandard" of course was tongue in cheek should have been in quotes. Some of the best teachers my kids have ever had were private school teachers (and some were public school teachers). What they had in common were lots of things. Teacher licensure wasn't one of them.

Anonymous said...

"Substandard" - as in someone with an undergrad degree in electrical engineering from one of the top engineering schools in the country, master's in engineering (ditto) and decades on industry experience, ending as one of the top 5 people in one of the foremost engineering companies in the country - nope, not qualified to teach math or physics in HS. Sigh...

Anonymous said...

BTW: a connection who was headmaster of one of the top academic private schools in a very affluent suburb said he'd crawl over broken glass to get someone like that on his faculty, even if he taught only one or two classes, and he'd accommodate the guy's schedule. And people wonder why parents pay private school tuition...

Catherine Johnson said...

They're speaking up against Teach for America?

wow