Those administrators are lazy.
Maybe in some cases. But I'm more inclined to place the blame on the people who lobbied for all those hoops that administrators need to jump through in the first place, rather than the administrators who won't jump through them. In some places it takes YEARS to get rid of a bad teacher, if it's possible at all.
My father was a principal in a union school for 25 years and fired the tenured teachers he needed to fire. Even so, the process can be reformed in places where it needs to reformed and some teachers' unions have agreed to reform where they and everyone else thinks it's necessary (like NYC).
Everywhere that the system has been reformed, the unions have had to be dragged kicking and screaming. Or at best, after they grudgingly make halfhearted concessions to avoid more fullthroated reform.
That's true, but if an older teacher is actually a bad teacher, then they can be fired. I'm actually quite sure the this is the unofficial policy of a lot of places including private businesses. You don't usually fire the veterans who know what they're doing first.
I don't know of any evidence that teachers improve over time, with the exception of the first couple years when they don't really know what they're doing yet. Some of the worst teachers I ever had were the 30+ year veterans.
But I haven't see any studies that such problems are big enough to actually have an impact on education. Can you provide me with something that says 'bad' teachers have any more of an impact on problems in the education system than 'bad' car salesman had on the collapse of the auto industry? Because to me they seem to be at the same level. Annoying, but certainly not worthy of being significant.
http://edpro.stanford.edu/Hanushek/admin/pages/files/uploads/teachers.econometrica.pdf
Can you explain why this is the fault of teachers' unions?
Many talented people simply don't want to go into the teaching profession because of the low pay and lack of meritocracy, which are both caused by the teachers unions. Of course there are exceptions, but in general, the type of person who pursues a career in a field with relatively low pay/recognition in exchange for total job security, is a different type of person than someone who pursues a career in a field with higher pay / more recognition but less job security. It's not that teachers are underpaid in this country, it's just that the teachers unions have lobbied to get more of their payments in something other than their salary...job security, long summers off, etc. That mindset is fundamentally not going to attract lots of talented people to the profession, which is why teachers tend to come from the bottom third of college classes in this country.
Which overly strict rules? And can you substantiate the claim that they 'completely eschew the concept of merit'? Considering that they support teacher certification, tenure only after a strict evaluation process and pay tied to advanced education, I think merit is something that they favor actually.
There is no evidence that having advanced degrees makes a person a better teacher.
I know that teachers do not want their pay and standing to be tied to standardized testing and grades since student performance on both are tied to many factors outside of the teachers' control. And considering that this is the plan most 'merit pay' advocates propose, I can't say that their objection to it is irrational. Do you? Do you think it makes sense to tie a teacher's evaluation and pay to the performance of student who may be affected by personal problems, poorly written tests and poor educational policies that teachers cannot control?
Standardized testing should be one of several components used to evaluate teachers, yes. Because the problems of individual students will average out in the aggregate. And I'm not talking about comparing a teacher of poor students to a teacher of wealthy suburban students, but we can compare similar cohorts to see which teachers are more effective. This, however, should be just one of several factors used to evaluate teachers. Others would include evaluations by the school administrators, and evaluations by other educators who ideally wouldn't know the teacher in question.
I'm somewhat cautious about the idea of "merit pay." I'm not sure what, if any, effect it would actually have on the performance of individual teachers, although it's worth trying. The more important merit-based decision would be for those on the bottom end: the truly awful teachers who need to be fired.
Can you substantiate the implication that 'mediocrity' is a staple among teachers? If so, can you that this 'mediocrity' is due to teachers unions rather than politicians or other sources?
It's due to politicians inasmuch as they listen to the teachers unions. But when you have a powerful lobby that prefers to get paid in job security and time off, what kinds of people do you think are going to be attracted to it?
And can you substantiate the implication that most teachers are directly responsible for students who perform poorly?
I said no such thing.
