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Text books, AV equipment, parenting, sports, even the school food, there are all sorts of things that affect children's performance that are nothing to do with the teachers.

Needless to say they're not well liked by the union. They're also some of the best teachers in the district so the union can't touch them.

And there's the rub. Its not about the members, its about the union.

 purplefood wrote:

 cincydooley wrote:

 LordofHats wrote:

 Seaward wrote:
Yep. Republicans are generally in favor of such horrific concepts as getting rid of bad teachers and paying based on performance. Teachers don't like those ideas.

Well they probably don't likek the later because its a terrible idea.

How is it a terrible idea????

A teacher's performance would be based on how well their students do.
If their students do poorly because they had a bad teacher that's one thing.
If their students do poorly because they can't be arsed to put the effort in or some other reason then why should the teacher be punished?

No, what you've described is how it is presently done in the United States.

Merit based pay would evaluate teacher performance as a separate metric from student performance but would require other types of evaluation like consistent random observations, student and parent feedback, etc.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Kilkrazy wrote:

 cincydooley wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
How does it blame Republicans?

It seems a straightforward enquiry into a factual point.

I think the wording of that question is incredibly poor. Take out the word "insists" and you've gone a long way toward making it less biased.

To what issue do House Republican leaders on tying the federal budget?

No, it doesn't make sense now. Let's try a few synonyms:

To what issue do House Republican leaders insist on tying the federal budget?

To what issue do House Republican leaders require tying the federal budget?

To what issue do House Republican leaders demand tying the federal budget?

To what issue do House Republican leaders maintain tying the federal budget?

Of course we must also consider that there could be observer bias operating in your evaluation of the situation.

It's more simple than that.

"To what issue are House Republican leaders tying the federal budget"

Not judgment words. Active instead of passive language. Fixed.

Student and parent feedback?
Frankly I wouldn't trust students to give good feedback and neither would I trust parents.
If there was a consistent random evaluation (Say a few times per term) that might work better.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
Text books, AV equipment, parenting, sports, even the school food, there are all sorts of things that affect children's performance that are nothing to do with the teachers.

Again, which is why you have to involved other evaluative methods, like with ANY OTHER JOB PERFORMANCE REVIEW......


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 purplefood wrote:
Student and parent feedback?
Frankly I wouldn't trust students to give good feedback and neither would I trust parents.
If there was a consistent random evaluation (Say a few times per term) that might work better.

And you'd be wrong. You have to get a large enough sample size to be able to eliminate obvious outliers (like anything).

In fact, parental and student feedback SHOULD figure in as they're the primary customers of whom teachers serve.

Obviously it shouldn't be the only metric, but it should figure in to the pie.

 cincydooley wrote:

How is it a terrible idea????

Because there's no workable metric that doesn't involve mountains of red tape that waste more money than the process would be worth. Standardized Tests? Those are already a huge part of the problem with US education. We don't need more standardization we need less. Grades? Well the teacher gives out the grades so I guess they can pick their own paygrade or just be honest and be boned out of any bonuses if they happen to be math or science. Peer review? What was that about unions not letting teachers get fired? You could go full blown with a review board but it would basically be a massive waste of time and a drain on an already overworked system. Half the problems with bad teachers are the fault of poor certification programs in a lot states. Pay for performance is a bad idea that masquarades around as a solution to a problem it doesn't fix in the slightest. There are places of work where output can be quantified but teaching just isn't one of them no to mention all the crap that would start up if you started doing it.

The things the education system needs the most are more money and more teachers (and for school boards to stop being made up of appointed officials with no background in education).

 cincydooley wrote:
Merit based pay would evaluate teacher performance as a separate metric from student performance but would require other types of evaluation like consistent random observations, student and parent feedback, etc.

I have a large number of teachers in my family, from high school through to university level and I can't really see how performance related pay can be brought in to the profession. Lesson observations are a highly subjective method of assessment and prone to influence by any number of factors (kids deciding that they are going to mess around, teacher not being particularly well on that day/time, observer's familiarity with the material, observer's teaching style (if any), etc...). Student feedback is about the most horrible way of judging a teacher's performance you could possibly imagine, and parent feedback can actually be worse (since almost everything is filtered through their child first before it gets to them).

Far better to tighten up the HR end of the system, so bad teachers are suitably noted, appropriate actions/interventions/training/etc logged to show that action has been attempted to correct defects and warnings/etc are properly noted. And then actually use that information to remove someone from their job if that is required... like you would in any other industry. That kind of management is lacking in so many settings it drives me mad - so many bad workers carrying on for years simply because simple procedures for logging and correcting unacceptable standards are not followed.

 SilverMK2 wrote:

 cincydooley wrote:
Merit based pay would evaluate teacher performance as a separate metric from student performance but would require other types of evaluation like consistent random observations, student and parent feedback, etc.

I have a large number of teachers in my family, from high school through to university level and I can't really see how performance related pay can be brought in to the profession. Lesson observations are a highly subjective method of assessment and prone to influence by any number of factors (kids deciding that they are going to mess around, teacher not being particularly well on that day/time, observer's familiarity with the material, observer's teaching style (if any), etc...). Student feedback is about the most horrible way of judging a teacher's performance you could possibly imagine, and parent feedback can actually be worse (since almost everything is filtered through their child first before it gets to them).

Far better to tighten up the HR end of the system, so bad teachers are suitably noted, appropriate actions/interventions/training/etc logged to show that action has been attempted to correct defects and warnings/etc are properly noted. And then actually use that information to remove someone from their job if that is required... like you would in any other industry. That kind of management is lacking in so many settings it drives me mad - so many bad workers carrying on for years simply because simple procedures for logging and correcting unacceptable standards are not followed.

As do I (and I was a teacher myself for 5 years) and I disagree wholeheartedly.

It would certainly take more effort on behalf of administrators, but it would be worth it. A educated observer/administrator wouldn't worry about how poorly a student was behaving, but would rather assess the teacher on their handling of that situation. Which is how they did it during Praxis 3s in Ohio before they were cut due to budget cuts.

Again, I fully believe that parent feedback is important. Obviously you, like I said, need large enoug sample sizes to remove outliers, but parents can offer important feedback on how a teacher interacts with them and their student.

And I disagree about student feedback. I think it can be incredibly valuable. It's easy to spot pandering and vindictiveness, but students absolutely know who their good and bad teachers are.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 LordofHats wrote:

 cincydooley wrote:

How is it a terrible idea????

Because there's no workable metric that doesn't involve mountains of red tape that waste more money than the process would be worth. Standardized Tests? Those are already a huge part of the problem with US education. We don't need more standardization we need less. Grades? Well the teacher gives out the grades so I guess they can pick their own paygrade or just be honest and be boned out of any bonuses if they happen to be math or science. Peer review? What was that about unions not letting teachers get fired? You could go full blown with a review board but it would basically be a massive waste of time and a drain on an already overworked system. Half the problems with bad teachers are the fault of poor certification programs in a lot states. Pay for performance is a bad idea that masquarades around as a solution to a problem it doesn't fix in the slightest. There are places of work where output can be quantified but teaching just isn't one of them no to mention all the crap that would start up if you started doing it.

The things the education system needs the most are more money and more teachers (and for school boards to stop being made up of appointed officials with no background in education).

So many things wrong with this.

Presently standardized tests are the ONLY metric by which teachers are evaluated, and until value added was introduced (which has copious problems on its own) automatically set teachers up to fail. Example: a teacher that had a 98% passage rate in year 1 and a 95% passage rate in year two would be considered a failing teacher because of lack of improvement or stagnation in scores, which leads us to ridiculous statements like "excellent failing" teachers (excellent determined by the %, failing due to lack of growth).

Further, we don't need more teachers right now. At all. There are plenty of highly qualified teachers that have been laid off and can't find jobs or have recently graduated and can't find jobs. What we need less of is programs like Teach for America that take these jobs from these well trained, dedicated people and give them to unqualified ivy grads that had a 5 week training class who use TFA as a stepping stone to other things or solely for the student loan payoffs.

Though we certainly agree on the money and school board point.

 cincydooley wrote:

Further, we don't need more teachers right now. At all. There are plenty of highly qualified teachers that have been laid off and can't find jobs or have recently graduated and can't find jobs. What we need less of is programs like Teach for America that take these jobs from these well trained, dedicated people and give them to unqualified ivy grads that had a 5 week training class who use TFA as a stepping stone to other things or solely for the student loan payoffs.

Well, no, what we need is a cultural regard for teachers that extends beyond "...those who can, do; those who can't, teach."

 dogma wrote:

 cincydooley wrote:

Further, we don't need more teachers right now. At all. There are plenty of highly qualified teachers that have been laid off and can't find jobs or have recently graduated and can't find jobs. What we need less of is programs like Teach for America that take these jobs from these well trained, dedicated people and give them to unqualified ivy grads that had a 5 week training class who use TFA as a stepping stone to other things or solely for the student loan payoffs.

Well, no, what we need is a cultural regard for teachers that extends beyond "...those who can, do; those who can't, teach."

Also entirely true.

Wow, It's even funnier when real people use words they don't understand than on the internet.

I wish someone would call me a Neo-Nazi. I would finally have an excuse to wear my feldgrau uniform out in town!

 hotsauceman1 wrote:
Just because it is the source does not mean the info is less valid.

What info is that exactly? Do you mean the totally unsubstantiated allegations? Or perhaps you mean the alleged phonecall to a friend who the guy won't name?

This seems like a pretty standard case of "parent takes issue with lesson" to me, up until the point where he starts making up what sounds like complete nonsense about "union thugs" conducting a smear campaign against him and the "story" is picked up by a right-wing pseudo-news blog and is then dutifully regurgitated as fact by Fox. If we're going to talk about biases, the fact that so many of you gents looked at that story, saw the word "union", and immediately accepted the guy's version of events when the story itself presents absolutely no corroborating evidence is an indication maybe some of you need to examine your own.

 Yodhrin wrote:

 hotsauceman1 wrote:
Just because it is the source does not mean the info is less valid.

What info is that exactly? Do you mean the totally unsubstantiated allegations? Or perhaps you mean the alleged phonecall to a friend who the guy won't name?

This seems like a pretty standard case of "parent takes issue with lesson" to me, up until the point where he starts making up what sounds like complete nonsense about "union thugs" conducting a smear campaign against him and the "story" is picked up by a right-wing pseudo-news blog and is then dutifully regurgitated as fact by Fox. If we're going to talk about biases, the fact that so many of you gents looked at that story, saw the word "union", and immediately accepted the guy's version of events when the story itself presents absolutely no corroborating evidence is an indication maybe some of you need to examine your own.

Sure, if you want to leave out the whole Neo-nazi bit!

 cincydooley wrote:

 Yodhrin wrote:

 hotsauceman1 wrote:
Just because it is the source does not mean the info is less valid.

What info is that exactly? Do you mean the totally unsubstantiated allegations? Or perhaps you mean the alleged phonecall to a friend who the guy won't name?

This seems like a pretty standard case of "parent takes issue with lesson" to me, up until the point where he starts making up what sounds like complete nonsense about "union thugs" conducting a smear campaign against him and the "story" is picked up by a right-wing pseudo-news blog and is then dutifully regurgitated as fact by Fox. If we're going to talk about biases, the fact that so many of you gents looked at that story, saw the word "union", and immediately accepted the guy's version of events when the story itself presents absolutely no corroborating evidence is an indication maybe some of you need to examine your own.

Sure, if you want to leave out the whole Neo-nazi bit!

That's what I'm talking about; look at the article again. "Friend says", "alleges" - the guy claims his friend told him that the teacher called the friend and inquired if the dad was a neo-nazi, and his friend claims he later received a threatening call from a senior figure in the union - either one could be lying out their arse, and no evidence was presented in the article to substantiate any of those three claims. Literally the only thing the article claims as factual is that he objected to the lesson, and the teacher sent him an email saying she disagreed with him and explaining why, after which he complained to the school principle and received a similar answer.

The fact that certain people can look at that and immediately condemn the teacher, the school, and the union speaks pretty loudly to their preconceptions about all three. The fact that they can leap to those conclusions when the article is provided courtesy of an unashamedly partisan blog presented by an unashamedly partisan news network...

 Yodhrin wrote:
That's what I'm talking about; look at the article again. "Friend says", "alleges" - the guy claims his friend told him that the teacher called the friend and inquired if the dad was a neo-nazi, and his friend claims he later received a threatening call from a senior figure in the union - either one could be lying out their arse, and no evidence was presented in the article to substantiate any of those three claims. Literally the only thing the article claims as factual is that he objected to the lesson, and the teacher sent him an email saying she disagreed with him and explaining why, after which he complained to the school principle and received a similar answer.

The fact that certain people can look at that and immediately condemn the teacher, the school, and the union speaks pretty loudly to their preconceptions about all three. The fact that they can leap to those conclusions when the article is provided courtesy of an unashamedly partisan blog presented by an unashamedly partisan news network...

Pretty clear at 0:57



And that video was directly linked in the article (twice). So there is actually evidence there if you had looked.

Dakka always hate teachers. It is almost as prevalant as blaming the victim.

 hotsauceman1 wrote:
Dakka always hate teachers. It is almost as prevalant as blaming the victim.

Dakka hates bad teachers, and zero tolerance policies.

 Dreadclaw69 wrote:

 Yodhrin wrote:
That's what I'm talking about; look at the article again. "Friend says", "alleges" - the guy claims his friend told him that the teacher called the friend and inquired if the dad was a neo-nazi, and his friend claims he later received a threatening call from a senior figure in the union - either one could be lying out their arse, and no evidence was presented in the article to substantiate any of those three claims. Literally the only thing the article claims as factual is that he objected to the lesson, and the teacher sent him an email saying she disagreed with him and explaining why, after which he complained to the school principle and received a similar answer.

The fact that certain people can look at that and immediately condemn the teacher, the school, and the union speaks pretty loudly to their preconceptions about all three. The fact that they can leap to those conclusions when the article is provided courtesy of an unashamedly partisan blog presented by an unashamedly partisan news network...

Pretty clear at 0:57



And that video was directly linked in the article (twice). So there is actually evidence there if you had looked.

You're kidding, right? So if I produce a recording of an unidentified American man asking if I am a neo-nazi accompanied by an edited screenshot from a phone with again no identifying information, and go to the press saying it's you, you would be OK with people accepting that without question?

Damn, you yanks have a pretty loose definition of the word "evidence". If the police examine this "evidence" and find the man's claims have merit? Fine, there's an issue here and the case must be answered, but I'm pretty damn sure that those of you who bought this hook line & sinker were the sort of people who already have low opinions of teachers and their unions.

EDIT: Let me put it this way - if the Huffington Post put out a story, sources from a blog with a well-known left-wing editorial agenda, in which an individual alleged they had an exchange with a teacher about what they considered to be a right-biased lesson plan, and claimed subsequently a friend of that person received a call from an unrelated teacher asking if the person was a communist/Islamic extremist, and as "evidence" presented a youtube video consisting of a cropped jpeg image and an unidentified audio clip - would you guys also immediately conclude that the guy is obviously telling the truth and start going all "rabble rabble rabble unions and stupid teachers rabble rabble"?

Aye right you would.

 Yodhrin wrote:
You're kidding, right? So if I produce a recording of an unidentified American man asking if I am a neo-nazi accompanied by an edited screenshot from a phone with again no identifying information, and go to the press saying it's you, you would be OK with people accepting that without question?

Damn, you yanks have a pretty loose definition of the word "evidence". If the police examine this "evidence" and find the man's claims have merit? Fine, there's an issue here and the case must be answered, but I'm pretty damn sure that those of you who bought this hook line & sinker were the sort of people who already have low opinions of teachers and their unions.

EDIT: Let me put it this way - if the Huffington Post put out a story, sources from a blog with a well-known left-wing editorial agenda, in which an individual alleged they had an exchange with a teacher about what they considered to be a right-biased lesson plan, and claimed subsequently a friend of that person received a call from an unrelated teacher asking if the person was a communist/Islamic extremist, and as "evidence" presented a youtube video consisting of a cropped jpeg image and an unidentified audio clip - would you guys also immediately conclude that the guy is obviously telling the truth and start going all "rabble rabble rabble unions and stupid teachers rabble rabble"?

Aye right you would.

1. I'm Irish
2. You're making amazing and sweeping generalisations in an attempt to make your point, which actually weakens your argument
3. Have you anything to actually counter the evidence put forward, or do you just not like the source?

 Dreadclaw69 wrote:
1. I'm Irish.

You can never trust the neutrals.

 cincydooley wrote:
No, what you've described is how it is presently done in the United States.

Merit based pay would evaluate teacher performance as a separate metric from student performance but would require other types of evaluation like consistent random observations, student and parent feedback, etc.

When the teacher's pay and/or job security is derived at least in part from how much the parent's like teacher, then you've just removed that teacher's ability to give honest, fearless advice to the parents. It's just another variant of 'teaching to the test'.

 Hlaine Larkin mk2 wrote:
How can you jump to the conclusion he's a neo-nazi just because of this incident?
All he wanted was both sides of an argument instead of the teacher pushing their side on their students.

I'm in college right now, and pushing their side onto the students is all that most of my professors do.

 sebster wrote:

 cincydooley wrote:
No, what you've described is how it is presently done in the United States.

Merit based pay would evaluate teacher performance as a separate metric from student performance but would require other types of evaluation like consistent random observations, student and parent feedback, etc.

When the teacher's pay and/or job security is derived at least in part from how much the parent's like teacher, then you've just removed that teacher's ability to give honest, fearless advice to the parents. It's just another variant of 'teaching to the test'.

Completely disagree, which I already explained. But then, you've probably been in a classroom and have worked with parents more than I have, so I'm sure you're right.

 cincydooley wrote:

 sebster wrote:

 cincydooley wrote:
No, what you've described is how it is presently done in the United States.

Merit based pay would evaluate teacher performance as a separate metric from student performance but would require other types of evaluation like consistent random observations, student and parent feedback, etc.

When the teacher's pay and/or job security is derived at least in part from how much the parent's like teacher, then you've just removed that teacher's ability to give honest, fearless advice to the parents. It's just another variant of 'teaching to the test'.

Completely disagree, which I already explained. But then, you've probably been in a classroom and have worked with parents more than I have, so I'm sure you're right.

Three of my immediate family are teachera and 2 are university lecturers - they all, and their unions, and most other teachers, think you are wrong. Just saying

chaos0xomega wrote:

 Seaward wrote:

chaos0xomega wrote:
I agree with slavetodorkness... I'm having a lot of trouble understanding how the jump was made from "please present both sides of the argument" to "NEO-NAZI!!!"

Go post something even vaguely Republican-sounding on any leftist site you care to name and see how quickly you get called at the very least a racist.

I dare not enter such wretched hives of scum and villainy.

The houses of parliment

But yeah, talk about a quick jump to irrational conclusions.

 Dreadclaw69 wrote:

3. Have you anything to actually counter the evidence put forward, or do you just not like the source?

Did you miss the part where he explained why it's not evidence of anything at all?

For example,

 Dreadclaw69 wrote:

I'm evil and I'm going to take over the world!

is not evidence that you're evil and are going to take over the world, despite apparently being a quote by you. The same way I forged this quote, someone could just as easily forge a screenshot of a cellphone. It just isn't evidence of anything on its own.

The teacher allegedly involved in the "neo-nazi" enquiry has apparently apologised for making that phone call.

You must either believe that Fox made up everything, or that the neo-nazi phrase actually was used, though such a phrase might be used in a non-serious manner.

When does someone nonseriously call another person a neo Nazi?

 Kilkrazy wrote:
The teacher allegedly involved in the "neo-nazi" enquiry has apparently apologised for making that phone call.

You must either believe that Fox made up everything, or that the neo-nazi phrase actually was used, though such a phrase might be used in a non-serious manner.

Do I believe Fox made up everything? I wouldn't put it past them, they have form. However I think it's more likely that they published a crock of crap from an online partisan source without bothering to properly check the facts, something for which they have even more form.

Again though, my point was not "this never happened", or even that "this man is a liar", it was to point out the fact that many people here are apparently happy to jump to conclusions and begin the blame & shame game based on lots of "allegedly"'s, "apparently"'s, and "has claimed"'s.

And Dreadclaw69; if you're Irish, either select Ireland as your location in your profile so the Irish flag shows next to your name, or don't get all huffy when people who don't know you from Adam see an American flag and think you're an American. I notice you also failed to address any of the points I raised, other than to vaguely waffle about "generalisations". As for countering the "evidence", I would have thought my repeated use of quotation marks around the word "evidence" made it fairly obvious that I don't think any of what's presented so far constitutes such, and won't until it's verified by a reasonably trustworthy and impartial third party like the police or the school district's own investigation.

 Frazzled wrote:
When does someone nonseriously call another person a neo Nazi?

When making a sarcastic comment about an apparently politically motivated complaint from a pushy parent.

"I can't believe that guy -- is he a neo-nazi or something?"

I don't know if this was the scenario but as a thing in real life it is not implausible.