Two men. Same job. Same pay. Anything else is unfair. Chicago teacher pay seems to vary wildly. Corruption appears to be afoot.
The American public education system is so fucked you may as well blow it up and start from scratch. When I was in my junior year (grade 11) at high school, I remember going on a student exchange for one week with a school in New Hampshire. The school (can't remember the name) was in a pretty nice upper-middle class neighbourhood. Anyway, I brought along some of my textbooks and when I was in an American History class, the teacher asked to see them. She said to me, "These are college binding. What are you doing with them?" I didn't know what "college binding" meant. She explained that the textbooks I had were used in American colleges and universities. I said we used them in my grade 11 classes. I think she almost started crying. Oh... and the day I was in that American History class, they were taking a test. As an exchange student, I didn't have to but I gave it a try anyway. I got the hightest score in the class.
Does T.R hate his teachers? By what criteria does someone who doesn't have kids in the system decide the results are poor? Does the responsibility for outcomes rest solely with the schools, or are there myriad other factors (parents, for example) involved? That aside, as you point out, if you're dissatisfied with your purchase in other venues, you go to someone in authority. Take your complaints about the individual school to that school's administrators. Take your complaints about the school system to the Board of Ed.
Does it bother you that your nation is so dependent on the good will and benevolence of another that you are forced to learn their system better than they do, just to keep from being accidentally squashed?
Ask me how well I know the Canadian system or how many Canadian message boards I hang out on? Hint; Canada is irrelevant. Okay, okay, one more hint. ZERO!
Re: Does T.R hate his teachers? Uh, by the outcomes? With the schools. They are the ones providing the service. Wholly owned subsidiaries of the teachers' unions with little interest in educational outcomes.
Re: Does T.R hate his teachers? And every kid who starts school is exactly the same as every other kid. Huh.
This isn't a socialist country. We don't believe in equality of result. Why don't you go hang out at Democratic Underworld?
79% of Chicago 8th graders not proficient in reading. No wonder the unions hate testing. It doesn't look good to stage a strike when your students can't even read.
But shouldn't they be able to hire based on merit, not based on somebody getting first dibs just because they were there before?
So, is it better for taxes to be spent on them and they end up brain dead serfs anyway? I think for money to be spent, there needs to be some accountability on behalf of the kids and the parents. You pay for shit out of your own pocket you are more accountable.
When I was in grade 8 the teachers decided to strike too in the middle of the year. Fuck them all. I lost 2 years of school because of that shit.
Odd... I recently made the acquaintance of a lovely Canadian lady, who told me they learn almost nothing about American history after the American Revolution and the War of 1812 (about which, I've learned, Canadians have a rather mean-spirited children's song). Perhaps it's because she's from northern Ontario, one of the 10% of your people to live more than 100 miles from the border with the US? Or was this colonial-era US history? Not trolling (much), actually curious.
Don't know what to say. It's been a long time since I was in high school. American history was offered as one of our electives so I took it. It was a one-year course that covered everything up until Vietnam. Of course, my school (which was a public school) also offered all kinds of other non-standard courses such as Latin, German, European history and microbiology. As I understand it, we were the only high school in the province equipped with a fully-functional microbiology lab, including an autoclave and fully-quarantinable classroom. Maybe times have changed.
WAB, as you yourself describe and acknowledge, your school was not the norm. The other thing, comparing to New Hampshire is not necessarily a valid sample. Education funding is really screwed up there due to the lack of any tax other than on property. Poor towns have poor schools, wealthy towns have good schools. And back in the 80s and 90s, NH had no state standards, so there would have been much variation in quality. The high school I went to also used college text books for the higher end elective courses, and it was in the United States, so
What amazes me is that the Teacher's unions are even fighting against politicians who usually bend to their every whim. They are pretty much proving the point that Republicans have made for years about public unions caring more about greed than people.
Well there you go. Schools are useless and pointless. Think how much money we'll save when we get rid of them and the Department of Education.
