Mrs. Gregoire wants to "invest" $200 million in math and science education.
I'm all in favor of improving math and science education. Unfortunately, Gregoire's proposal reads like another list of dunderhead ideas from the same loserocracy that brought us the WASL.
One questionable idea is to lower class sizes using underqualified teachers. Better, I think, to have teachers who throughly grasp the material than to have slightly smaller classes, many of which are staffed by hastily trained teachers who didn't major in math or science. The other counterproductive proposal is
Pay annual bonuses of $5,000 to nationally certified teachers who teach in a "challenging" school and another $5,000 if they teach math or science.Better to give bonuses for transforming a "challenging" school into a successful school. As proposed, this is a financial incentive for the school to remain "challenging" indefinitely. Posted by Stefan Sharkansky at December 11, 2006 04:14 PM | Email This
Research has shown that reducing class sizes from say 30 to 25 doesn't do any good (though better teachers do make a difference) that you have to get class size down to 12 or less to make a difference. However, if the money could be used in just a couple grade levels, say 5th and 6th grade to reduce class sizes to 12 or less, then you might see more of those students advance faster, able to take algebra as 8th graders.
Sounds like she is getting recommendations from the teacher unions who seem to always support Jr. High and High school teachers more than elementary teachers. At the elementary level you can use less qualified teachers in a setting with smaller class sizes, but at the high school level it would be the students teaching the teachers.
Posted by: Doug on December 11, 2006 04:41 PMWhere will we find good math and science teachers? Gates had this to say:
How are we going to hire more teachers to teach high-level courses when there's already a scarcity in those fields? The answer is we can't--if we stay within the current system. But we can find those teachers, if we use a performance-based human resource approach in preparing, hiring, developing and compensating our teachers.
The Washington Learns report says that our teacher pay system should recognize staff expertise, use incentives, and reward achievements. I endorse that. Differential pay is essential to improving our schools. Public schools are not part of the private sector, but they are nonetheless affected by market forces--especially as it relates to recruiting and retaining talented professionals. It's astonishing to me that we could have a system that doesn't allow us to pay more for someone with rare abilities, that doesn't allow us to pay more to reward strong performance. That is tantamount to saying "teacher talent and performance don't matter"... and that's basically saying: "students don't matter."
Of course, he's right.
Gregoire's suggestions may help a little in trying to overcome the defects in the system, but when will the system itself be improved?
Posted by: Micajah on December 11, 2006 05:41 PMHer plan will fail because the real problems are not addressed. "Challenging" schools is a polite way of saying there is no discipline and no administrator with any backbone to support teachers who really do try to teach. Reducing class size will not work; bonuses will not work (check out the Detroit system if you think this hasn't been tried before); and teacher "training" will not work.
As one who did set out to be a science teacher, I can tell you the only districts that have real problems keeping quality teachers are ones like Seattle, Washington D.C., Chicago, etc. If you want a job in any district with a halfway decent reputation, you have to wait until someone dies, retires, or moves into management. Part of the problem is that you don't choose the school you want to work at in the bigger systems. It is not at all uncommon to find out that the job you thought you were applying for is no longer available so you will instead be sent to either a "challenging" school or put into a junior high (the secondary certificate covers junior high and high school). I did not want to teach junior high and I didn't want to work for a system that would shuffle me around at whim, so I ended up have to forego teaching high school chemistry.
It isn't that there is a shortage of good people wanting to teach. There is a shortage of common sense in the administrations of the big districts. When you enforce dress codes and rules of behavior, and celebrate academic excellence first and foremost over "self esteem", there will be no shortage of decent candidates. And for those who still whine that pay is an issue, the private schools tend not to pay as much as most public districts and have fewer staffing problems. Of course most private schools also expect their students to behave and to pay attention in class. Golly, what a radical notion. This is why we need vouchers.
Posted by: Burdabee on December 11, 2006 05:54 PMNow, I've occasionally been known to get something wrong, but doesn't that mean Governor Gregoire is doing almost THE EXACT OPPOSITE of what was recommended?
Almost every single one of her "professional development" recommendations will result in either more WEA dues-paying teachers, or more money for existing teachers (with higher dues paid to the WEA.) More money into the WEA = more money supporting Democratic campaigns.
Like I said before, it should've been called "Washington Learns (How To Pay Off The WEA)"...
Posted by: Randy Mueller on December 11, 2006 05:59 PMAccording to the article funding for the program will come, at least in part, from the current $1.9 billion state surplus. The article also indicates that Mr. & Mrs. Bill Gates are keen for this type of program.
Upon reading the article my questioning mind wondered if this is a vital program or another step towards tax-payer funded day care. My question was laid to rest later with the first, and so far one-and-only comment, posted in a SOUNDOFF response to the article. Although it's only one response I believe it summarizes what the program will amount to and how education is perceived by far too many in this state.
1. Follow the money.
2. There is little research to directly link teacher certification to student achievement. Although, the study sample is small, there is an interesting study out of Tennessee about national cerification.
Sanders, T. (2002). Synthesis of reviews of "the value-added achievement gains of
NBPTS-certified teachers in Tennessee: A brief report." Education Consumers
Briefs. Retrieved September 26, 2002 from
http://www.education-consumers.com/briefs/ECS%20review.htm
Linda Darling-Hammond of Stanford has attacked the findings in journals.
Hess has summarized what does affect student achievement:
a. A teacher that has graduated from a top school that demands rigor in preparation.
b. A grounding in the subject that the teacher is expected to teach.
c. A strong teacher induction system which pairs mentors and master teachers with the new teacher.
Certification is one way to control the number of teachers. It is the basis of the monopoly. Certification is no guarantee of a teacher that will positively impact the achievement of their students.
3. Some studies have shown that teachers long to be professionals and would trade some dollars for more control over how they accomplish their work, like other professionals.
4. No one wants to look at the current insitutional structure because it would anger current stakeholders. Follow the money, this new
"plan" isn't going to work because it keeps the same instituional structure in place.
Here is the link to the WASL practice test for yourself or Stephen or anyone else who might want to see exactly what the test requires. By the way, I graduated from high school 25+ years ago, never took more than Algebra 1 and Geometry, major in Journalism in college so I wouldn't have to take more math and I still managed a 93% on the practice test. I believe the percentage necessary to pass the WASL is only 50-55%, so the fact that almost half the kids in the state can't pass is indicitive of a complete lack of "basic, rote mathematical principals".
http://www.k12.wa.us/assessment/WASL/MathPracticeTests/HSmathematicsPracticeWASL-studentparent.pdf
Posted by: Suzihomemaker on December 12, 2006 09:26 AMSupreme Farce
By Thomas Sowell
Tuesday, December 12, 2006
It might be a hilarious comedy routine to have a group of highly educated judges solemnly expounding on something that everybody knows to be utter nonsense. But it isn't nearly as funny when this solemn discourse about nonsense takes place on the Supreme Court of the United States -- and when most people are unaware of what nonsense the learned justices are talking.
The issue before the High Court is whether local authorities have the legal right to make students' race a factor in deciding which school to assign them to attend.
The parent of a white student is complaining because he is not allowed to go to the school near where he lives but is instead being assigned to a different school far away, in order to create the kind of racial mix of students the local authorities are seeking, in the name of "diversity."
Those of us old enough to remember the landmark 1954 Supreme Court decision in Brown v. Board of Education will see a painful irony now, since that case began because a black girl was not allowed to go to a school near where she lived but was instead assigned to a different school far away, because of the prevailing racial dogmas of that day.
The racial dogmas have changed since 1954 but they are still dogmas. And flesh-and-blood children are still being sacrificed on the altar to those dogmas.
Some of the learned justices are pondering whether there is a "compelling" government interest in creating the educational and social benefits of racial "diversity." If so, then supposedly it is OK to do to white kids today what the Supreme Court back in 1954 said could not be done to black kids -- namely, assign children to schools according to their race.
What are those "compelling" benefits of "diversity"? They are as invisible as the proverbial emperor's new clothes. Yet everyone has to pretend to believe in those benefits, as they pretended to admire the naked emperor's wardrobe.
Not only is there no hard evidence that mixing and matching black and white kids in school produces either educational or social benefits, there have been a number of studies of all-black schools whose educational performances equal or exceed the national average, even though most black schools fall far below the average.
My own study of successful all-black schools was published 30 years ago in The Public Interest quarterly. Since then, there have been other studies of similar schools across the country, published by the Heritage Foundation in Washington and by scholars Abigail and Stephan Thernstrom, among others.
There have also been all-Chinese-American schools that exceeded national norms. How have such schools managed to succeed and excel without the "compelling" need for a racial mixing of students?
Look at it another way: Have black kids bussed into white schools had their test scores shoot up? No -- not even after decades of bussing.
Some black students -- in fact, whole schools of them -- have performed dramatically better than other black students and exceeded the norms in white schools.
Yet this phenomenon, which goes back as far as 1899 and included an all-black school within walking distance of the Supreme Court that declared such things impossible back in 1954, is totally ignored.
Are such things exceptional? Yes. But the mystical benefits of "diversity" are non-existent, however politically correct it is to proclaim such benefits.
Hard evidence shows that students of all races can succeed or fail in schools that are racially mixed or racially unmixed.
The latest variation on the theme of mixing and matching by race is that there needs to be a "critical mass" of black students in a given school or college, in order for them to perform up to standard.
Not only is there no hard evidence for this dogma, such hard evidence as there is points in the opposite direction. Bright black kids have benefitted from being in classes with other bright kids, regardless of the other kids' color.
All this is ignored in the Supreme Court's supreme farce.
Thomas Sowell is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institute and author of Basic Economics: A Citizen's Guide to the Economy.
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The 1.9 Billion dollar surplus won't last very long with P'n away $400 mil in one week....
Posted by: GS on December 13, 2006 10:23 PM