Posted on 11/11/2014 5:37:40 AM PST by reaganaut1
The Obama administration is directing states to show how they will ensure that all students have equal access to high-quality teachers, with a sharp focus on schools with a high proportion of the poor and racial minorities.
In a letter to state superintendents released Monday, Deborah S. Delisle, an assistant secretary at the Department of Education, said states must develop plans by next June that make sure that public schools comply with existing federal law requiring that “poor and minority children are not taught at higher rates than other children by inexperienced, unqualified or out-of-field teachers.”
States last submitted plans to address such inequities in 2006, but data shows that large disparities persist.
“It is important to remind our states that one step in front of the other is the way to begin to deliver for all our students,” said Catherine Lhamon, assistant secretary for civil rights, in a conference call with reporters. “We are all dismayed by the lack of compliance and lack of satisfaction and delivery on this point.”
The Education Department will send each state data collected by the department’s Office for Civil Rights showing rates of teacher experience, certification, absenteeism and salary by school as well as student access to taxpayer-funded preschool and advanced courses in math and science.
The administration is also urging states to look at teacher evaluations to determine whether those who receive lower ratings are disproportionately assigned to schools with high proportions of racial minorities and students in poverty.
But the only requirement of states is that they ensure that teachers are equitably distributed based on experience and credentials.
Education advocates said such measures could limit improvements in the quality of instruction in struggling schools.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
>>One reason experienced teachers tend to transfer out of schools with lots of minority students is that some students don’t treat them with respect. But the Obama administration is making that problem worse with its demands that minority students not be disciplined at higher rates than whites.
One other reason is that the ADMINISTRATION and DISTRICT don’t teach them with respect either. I left my job in 98% minority school, not because of how bad the students were (because they are easy to control), but because the assistant principal was HORRIBLE. She showed a lack of respect for her fellow teachers, and 40% of the staff left as a result.
Direct collision course with Teachers Unions.
More senior teachers get to pick their locations, and guess what? Most are not eager to fight in the Ghetto.
This should be fun to watch.
Liberals’ ultimate goal is the complete Federalization of education.
Most of the lousy teachers are minorities that superintendents have to employ to make the Ed Dept. in D. C. happy with the color count. As a retired Texas teacher, I have taught with many of them.
How many high quality teachers are left in public schools anymore? No disrespect intended, but they are definitely the quickly-shrinking minority.
Use technology. A few good terachers record their lessons. Everyone else is a babysitter or cell guard as the case may be.
Two solutions...
1. Round up all the teachers, put them on busses and forcibly transport them to the failing schools.
2. Make all of the schools suck so that there are no schools better than the others.
That’s how a commie dictator would do it.
This is my 28th year in public education and I can say without a doubt that the absolute best thing that could happen to public education would be the elimination of the Federal Department of Education.
It’s because experienced teachers both know not to waste their time teaching Obamathugs and have earned the right to pick their school and students.
And candidly you can’t polish turds. It’d be a waste of triaged resources to focus on the thugs. They are generally a hopeless case and certainly statistically far less likely to cure cancer.
In short, once again, Obama is an idiot.
Good teachers are likely to put up with the abuse they will get in problem schools.
“There is nothing so unequal as the equal treatment of unequals”
I forget where I first heard that, but I think it is a profound statement.
For kids who learn differently, you could have a small number of humans who are well-trained to educate willing students.
For troublemakers, put them in a cell and turn the TV on. It's a lifestyle they'll just have to get used to.
Maybe they should put more effort into assigning parents.
Sounds good to me but FIRST let’s CLOSE public schools until the federal government is OUT of Education!
Guess that ‘splains why Baltimore and Detroit city schools have so many foreign teachers over here in H1B. Because Americans are just knocking down their doors to apply, eh?
Educrats have their own formal definition for terms like ‘excellence’ and ‘quality’. Their definitions don’t necessarily mean what you might think.
“If I were a teacher in public schools today, I would be looking for a landing zone outside the public school business.”
A friend of ours was a public school teacher for over 20 years. She abruptly quit and went to work at a Catholic school. Interesting facts:
She’s not Catholic
She took over a $15k per year pay cut
She has to teach more classes
Why? As she explains it, the answer is simple. At the Catholic school, somebody starts acting up in her class and they are OUT. Gone, bye-bye, adios. In public school it was total chaos in the classroom with nothing that could be done about it. Or as she says, “I’m actually teaching again.”
I’ll tell the story of Huntsville, Alabama.
As the feds stepped into the system in the 1960s...to remake the school system and “fix” the problems, an interesting school system came into effect. Two of the city districts had become predominately black, and thus the schools in those districts went the same direction (although run by the fed mandate). The remaining schools in the city found that more and more parents were moving out of the city to the “burbs” and thus in the county school system. The better city school teachers? They got themselves transferred to the county.
By 2010, the city realized that if they did nothing....they’d become like Birmingham within two decades (the worst educational system in the state).
So, they brought in a former Army general, remade the districts, and fought tooth-and-nail against bad teachers, stagnant parent attitudes, and absolute belief that all schools torn down....would be replaced in the same neighborhood with the same names and same teachers.
The feds? They tried to step back into the battle but found that neither the Democrats or Republicans were going to support them. Other than a few community groups...they couldn’t find anyone supporting the continuing trend. The fired teachers? I’m sure that they found other counties in the state to accept them.
The city even hired a former FBI guy to cruise Facebook profiles and name gang-players in the school system. Those kids? They got tossed out. What the gang-players discovered next was that the county school system refused them. So, other than going to the next county over, or getting into a private school....they weren’t going to be accepted. Rough treatment, but it’s what people asked for.
If a governor had any backbone she or he would respond as follows:
“We will take up this issue as soon as the President, every member of Congress, every cabinet secretary, and every senior administration official has enrolled their children in the local public schools.”
“EQUAL ACCESS”... those two words are the DEMS mantra...means EVERY ONE gets the same crappie service...whether it is education or Internet or healthcare
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