In my research of the subject it seemed there were 2 complaints: 1) Parents don't see the evaluation 2) Teachers with poor evaluations were offered no training.
You may be right on #1. The best advice I could give is to be wary of a teacher that won't discuss it with you. I'm an open book in regards to my professional life. The reason I don't know for sure is that it doesn't cause me concern. Anyone has a standing invitation to observe my class- announced or unannounced. On #2, my system offers training. Every damn cent we got from Race to the Top money went to training. We didn't get a dime- not even performance bonuses. I assure you, administrators are itching to rid their schools of dead weight as soon as possible because their jobs depend on our performance. I have no problems with any of that, by the way. Most of your older "I'm in cruise control" teachers left the year the evals started or retired after last year when they saw what the evals were requiring. It takes some time to see the fruits of this to show. Try to be patient. We really are working very hard at this.
JayVols, somebody told me something about the education system that sounded insane, and I'm not sure whether you can confirm or deny, but I might as well ask. Is it true that funding for education is directly proportional to the property taxes in the district? If so, isn't this insane? It seems like the places in low-rent districts are the ones who need more money for schools.
It is BS that you have not gotten a raise in 10 years. I assume that the past 4 years could be explained by the economy (i.e, as property values have decreased so have taxes). Correct me if I am wrong but I assume that the budget increased during the 1st 6 years; what did administrators do with the money?
Capitalist philosophy is great, but doesn't really apply as easily to things like careers. The market can change much more rapidly than a human can adjust to. In my short 10 years as an adult, the supply and demand for many occupations to the point of hilarity. It isn't that simple.
This isn't about me whining about my finances, the question was about improving America. Sometimes strict economics isn't all it appears to be. Yeah, not going into fields that are cost efficient may seem like a wise idea, but at what cost? Since we are discussing teachers, I shudder to think of a society without quality teachers due to prospective college students going by a strict cost-benefit analysis. There seems to me that a reasonable balance of financial as well as other considerations must be included in the discussion. Regardless, I still think that the economic benefits of a society lacking the 20 year burden of student loans are worthwhile, as it's done in places like Scandinavia and Germany.
Fewer people going into teaching equals higher salaries. Higher salaries equals higher quality teachers.
There are 2 components: 1. State funding (majority and uniform throughout the state) 2. Local funding (property tax is the main item but not only item) It is the local portion where the varying pay from system to system occurs. I could drive 20 minutes east everyday and get a significant raise. My system ranks around 125th-130th out of 136 systems due to less tax base and the lower local salary component.
That will be a auto-adjusting situation along the lines of survival of the fittest. The chaos of this population explosion will result in the deaths of millions thereby reducing the population level to a more manageable level.
There are fundamental problems with public education, and this is one obvious one. Poor folks tend to get poor education.
Gave the Director and the Supervisors raises and grew the Central Office staff by over 100%. Here's another example of the cronyism and bullshit I put up with in regards to pay (names redacted): Maintenance Director............ salary would have increased from $34,780 to $50,331 and Transportation Director.........salary would have increased from $34,788 to $47,388.- This is from one f**king year to the next. No gradual step ups. It says would have, but the pay increases went through. We got zilch. For fairness and honesty, we are getting a $500 raise (I think) this school year; however, the Director is getting around $4,000. I might be off some but you can see the bullshit level. You can't vote them out. Unless you are of the Red party, you don't win and they're all in cahoots. Voters in this county are dumber than a bag of hammers.
I obviously sympathize with the lack of raises for teachers. However, I doubt that you have fallen behind other professions with the same education requirements. Teachers are required to have a Bachelor's degree to teach and get paid around $35,000 for 10 months work. There aren't many other professions requiring only a bachelor's degree that's exceeding that these days. Hell, come work at the DA's office where you don't do much better than that with a J.D.
Economics 101 doesn't fit everything. Fewer teachers equal larger class sizes and poorer education. Haslam is a moron for proposing dropping class size mandates. Typical businessman trying to impose private sector philosophy in education that is a horrible idea if you want better educational results.
Starting salary for an assistant district attorney anywhere in the state of Tennessee is roughly $42,500. Combine the average amount of student loan debt incurred by someone with a J.D. and a teacher is doing at least as good as an ADA.
You should be raising immortal hell with me. The term "Public servants" is not to be taken literally.
I should also qualify my statement. You get step raises as an ADA. After 20 years, I think, you max out at about $110,000 per year. But, it takes a long, long time to get to that level, and the state has a habit of freezing the step raises.
Yeah, I'll hit 20 yrs next year. I'll be making more than $10k less than half of that with my masters.
