Perhaps "red herring" would be a better term. (This is a reposting.)

By framing this as an argument about teachers and their abilities, it PRESUMES that the 'problem' (at least in large part) is teachers. What this ignores is the fact that every student has MANY teachers as he/she navigates their way through the public schools. Every student, however, has far fewer parents -- but we're not testing parents, are we? Of course not. We can't get our jollies by firing parents.

By forming this UTOPIAN vision of the 'perfect teacher' we're engaging in a common form of blame-shifting that evades any problem-solving process whatsoever. In other words, it's a COP-OUT. (That 60s term is a well-grounded one, based in that era's better comprehension of dealing with problems.) Virtually ANYONE can create a Potemkin School ... and 'prove' they have the handle on what to do. Yes ... and it'll involve privatization, prayer, discarding the 'unteachables' (i.e. handicapped and behaviorally at-risk) and, even more, PAYING MORE per student. (That latter 'feature' is rarely examined in the pink glow of utopian hallucinting.)

The framing MUST refocus on the very strengths and advantages of a public school SYSTEM itself. That's the pooling of resources and coordinated efforts and community involvement. As we slice and dice that system, creating carved-out 'alternatives' and other innovative ways of crippling the system by denying funding and other resources, we are participating in the creation of the 'problem.'

The metrics for success are clear and have been clear for a long time. Student-to-teacher ratio, funding-per-student, keeping the number of empty stomachs low, and using the students themselves as 'resources.' When schools become huge, anonymizing factories and get run with POLITICAL agendas, they fail.


But trying to voice this is like pissing into the wind. STUPID people will continue to be anointed as experts in education. Strange.


Back to our regular DU posturing.