People with real degrees in real subjects cannot teach our children, only those with specialized degrees in education. Degrees which include things like 3 credit courses on "use of AV equipment", but no courses on the construction of reliable and valid tests to measure student performance (a real example from the University of Nebraska). The education majors who pass through our Math for Elementary School Teachers at Kansas State often need to be taught fractions and decimals and lately, I am told by a colleague the multiplication tables. Two years later, without taking any more math, they will by "qualified teachers" with a permit from the state to each elementary and junior high, while a math major, who actuall knows enough to challenge even the brightest students is "unqualified" because he or she hasn't submitted the mind-mumbingly stupid curriculum of the College of Education.
If I had to pick one monopoly to gbeak, it would be the second. No massive restructure, just "Freedom to Teach" laws, which permit anyone with a degree from an acredited college or university to teach the school version of his or her major subject.
In point of fact, the only thing one needs special training, beyond a good knowledge of the content, to teach is reading. Not because you or I can't teach our kids to read--I did--but because there are special tricks one needs to know to teach 30 kids how to read all at the same time when you only see them 6 hours a day 180 days a year.
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the monopoly granted to "teachers colleges" and "Colleges of Education" by most of the servral states to credential teachers is also broken. |
6 Feb 2001-Protecting Teacher Incompetence in Los Angeles...There are approximately 300,000 teachers in California. According to the state records, between 1990 and 1999, only 227 dismissal cases even reached the decision phase. If all these cases occurred in a single year, they would amount to only slightly more than one tenth of one percent of the tenured teachers in the state. Over a full decade, the number is a proxy for zero. "It takes longer to fire a teacher than to convict a murderer," says Diana Halpenny, general counsel for the San Juan Unified School District near Sacramento.
...The Grossmont district near San Diego spent eight years and more than $300,000 to fire Juliet Ellery, an instructor described by her superintendent as the worst teacher he had ever seen, and who refused to answer students' questions in class. With firing incompetents a practical impossibility, most districts buy out contracts or transfer the teacher to another school, a process known as the "dance of the lemons." In many cases no action is taken, with many of the state's six million students bearing the consequences. Recent research by William L. Sanders at the University of Tennessee confirms that the difference between a good and bad teacher is enormous, a full grade level by some estimates. Successive years of bad teachers is devastating for a child, a situation surely common in Los Angeles, which spends more than $9000 per student per year, far above the state average.
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People with real degrees in real subjects cannot teach our children only those with specialized degrees in education. |
Policy Review, September-October 1998 -- Laboratories of ... A study by the National Center for Education Statistics confirmed that grade inflation has been far more pronounced in the nation's education departments than in other fields. The average grade in an education course was 3.41, compared with 2.96 in social sciences and 2.67 in science and engineering. We also found that many teacher-preparation programs were increasing the departmental requirements for education courses at the expense of strong preparation in academic subjects. ...New York's
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"Freedom to Teach" laws which permit anyone with a degree from an acredited college or university to teach the school version of his or her major subject. In point of fact the only thing one needs special training beyond a good knowledge of the content to teach is reading. |
06/13/97 - New Nationwide Study!
...The parents had higher than average educational attainment; 46% of the fathers had a bachelor's degree or higher and 42% of the mothers had the same. These families' median annual income of $43,000 was a little lower than the median for all married-couple families in the United States. The parents spent, on average, $546 per child per year for home education.
The mother did 88% of the formal teaching of the children while the father did 10% of the teaching. The large majority of these children were not being taught by professionally trained and government certified teachers.
On average, the children had been taught at home for 5 years since age 5, 85% were in grades K through 8, and their parents planned to home educate them through their secondary school years. Parents hand picked curriculum materials-rather than purchasing complete programs-for 71% of the students. The social activities of these children were quite varied; for example, 47% were involved in music classes, 48% were involved in group sports, and 77% participated in Sunday school.
These students scored, on the average, at high percentiles on standardized academic achievement tests: (a) total reading, 87th, (b) total language, 80th, (c) total math, 82nd, (d) total listening, 85th, (e) science, 84th, (f) social studies, 85th, (g) study skills, 81st, (h) basic battery (typically, reading, language, and mathematics), 85th, and (i) complete battery (all subject areas in which student was tested), 87th. (The national average is the 50th percentile.)
Achievement was statistically significantly related, in some cases, to father’s education level, mother’s education level, gender of student, years home educated, use of libraries, who administered the test, and use of computers. The relationships were, however, weak and not practically significant.
The Home School Court Report Vol. XVI, No. 5 -- Encouraging Test Scores ...Home schoolers' outstanding test results have blown away the myth that parents must be certified teachers. Over 30 state legislatures have recognized home schooling as a valid educational option since 1983.
Encouraged by home schoolers' impressive test results, many parents, who would not have started otherwise, have gained the confidence to begin home schooling. Additionally, such test results score points with concerned grandparents, in-laws and friends.
Volume 10 Number 26 Bauman: Home Schooling in the United States
Home schoolers are not especially likely to be young or old. They are about as likely to be of one sex or the other, with perhaps a slightly greater percentage female. In some ways, however, home-schoolers do stand out. Home schooled children are more likely to be non-Hispanic White, they are likely to live in households headed by a married couple with moderate to high levels of education and income. They are more likely to live in households with three or more children and they are likely to live in a household with an adult not in the labor force.
Table 2Characteristics of Home-Schooled Children and their Families
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|
1994 |
1996 |
1999 |
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|
|
Home |
Regular |
Home |
Regular |
Home |
Regular |
Age |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
6-7 |
24.0 |
17.2 |
11.7 |
17.4 |
13.8 |
17.8 |
|
8-10 |
30.6 |
25.6 |
25.9 |
25.6 |
26.1 |
25.0 |
|
11-14 |
27.8 |
33.8 |
34.0 |
33.1 |
31.7 |
32.4 |
|
15-17 |
17.5 |
23.4 |
28.5 |
24.0 |
28.4 |
24.9 |
Mother's education |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Less than h.s. |
8.8 |
17.7 |
14.2 |
16.4 |
5.3 |
16.4 |
High school |
31.2 |
35.4 |
23.6 |
33.7 |
28.9 |
29.2 |
Some college |
37.9 |
28.9 |
40.5 |
28.3 |
34.3 |
29.9 |
Bachelor's |
19.3 |
12.9 |
17.5 |
15.1 |
22.5 |
16.3 |
Advanced |
2.9 |
5.1 |
4.2 |
6.5 |
9.0 |
8.1 |
... Must it also be limited to households where parents have moderate to high education? While it would seem that having a (well educated) parent at home would be a prerequisite for engaging in home schooling, this is not an absolute requirement. Many home school households have working adults and adults with low education. In all three surveys a small number of home-schooled children lived with a single parent or with two adults in the labor force full time. In addition, a small number had no adult in the home with a high school diploma.
Grandfather Education Report, page B - by MWHodges Home-schoolers:
in SATs, ACTs, spelling & geography bees.
Three times more students are home-schooled than in charter schools,
and growing 11% per year