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Re: Different Accountability System Needed
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Bill Pelland



Joined: 25 Feb 2008 07:34 am
Posts: 425
Posted: 09 Jun 2008 08:57 am
Post Subject: Re: Different Accountability System Needed Read Article
WOW!


W.G. Kenney writes:
Being a teacher, I talk to hundreds of teachers from all levels and from all over the nation each year. I've never met a teacher that didn't want to be successful. I've never met a teacher that was opposed to the concept of student accountability. But I've met quite a few that disagree with giving a kid one test, and testing them only one way, with passing/failing at stake. But that is precisely what we do to them today.

People complain about teachers teaching only to the test. Dang Skippy they do it--because if they don't, they'll be made to look like idiots in the newspaper. Some of the best teaching we see occurs in April and May after the TAKS test is administered. That is when you can walk into a classroom and see kids engineering mock bridges out of toothpicks, building skyscrapers with newspaper, designing Martian landing devices that protect the egg on simulated atmospheric entry, and competing to see which team can do it the quickest, strongest, cheapest, etc.


Sadly I read this after I read your response on McCain and your comments about socialism and progressive. I have two siblings that are now retired teachers and a nephew that teaches High School math (as did his father). Your comments above hit the nail right on the head.

One of the reasons I support Obama is his views on education. He sees the need to improve teaching materials in disadvantaged schools, he stands for recognizing our teachers for the fine jobs they do, not only with lip service but with higher pay as well. He talks about improving the schools while telling parents to turn off the TV sets. He talks about helping those grads who take up teaching with their student loans.

One of my big concerns is education in this country and I have watched while teachers are chastised for poor scores while we tie one hand behind their back. 25% of students in this country and in Texas do not graduate from high school. The TIMM test given to 4th, 8th, and 12th grade students in areas of math and science show that compared to other nations, the US ranks near the top at 4th grade level, near the middle by 8th grade and near the bottom at 12th grade.

I suspect that drugs in the school have a lot to do with dropouts and poor performance. One of the early signs of drug abuse is a drastic drop in grades from one period to the next. Recognizing this we should develope intervention programs designed to 1. Treat the dependency problem and 2. remove the offender to alternative education until we can be sure the drug problem is gone. This may require a mandatory drug test of targeted students and I am quite sure the ACLU would throw a fit.

Back to education: My opinion is that testing to measure a student's progress should be done to help evaluate the student so as to better help in the education process. These tests do not accurately measure teacher performance as different schools have different student make up. Where one school may have a large number of non-english speaking families and students another school may not.

Statistics cannot be the measure used to measure job performance. Parent feedback along with student performance on an individual basis would seem to be a more effective method.

I am sure you would agree that a parent saying "well done" is much more important than a test score.

You should take a second look at Obama and compare his stand on education to McCain's. A strong economy depends on an educated population. Education and a strong economy has as much to do with national security as a strong military.

Keep up the good work. You have the future of our nation in your hands.


Vote Obama / Noriega
Yes we can! Yes we will!

Bill Pelland
Murchison, TX

Bill Pelland
Murchison Tx
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Author Replies
W.G. Kenney



Joined: 09 Feb 2008 08:09 am
Posts: 48
Posted: 09 Jun 2008 10:53 pm
Post Subject: Re: Different Accountability System Needed
Mr Pelland,

I appreciate your taking the time for the Obama educational stump speech. I commend you for your tenacity in your defense of Obama--you have every right to do so, and I don't hold any hard feelings against you for your views. But lets get something straight because it's a long time until November. It wouldn't matter to me if Obama stood up and promised 6-figure salaries for every teacher in America and abolition of all standards based testing...I would not vote for him. He has misled his supporters about his upbringing, his schooling, and he has sugar coated his religious views to the point that I don't trust him. His "vision" for America is a pipe dream. His tactics of talking about hope and change are great--but he cannot deliver. That being said, I'm certainly not a supporter of McCain--there were at least 3 GOP candidates that I would have voted for over him. I'm just stuck with him.

You can do it for the other readers, but in the future, you will not need to respond to me personally to defend or support Obama. My mind is made up. The regular readers of this forum know where you stand.

The only real candidate for change in America will be a candidate who refuses to prostitute themselves out to one of the two political parties. And with the current system, the Democrats and Republicans have made it virtually impossible for that to happen. Both parties know that they are very susceptible to major defeat if a serious 3rd party candidate emerges, so they have written the rules and manipulated the media to a point where that just simply can't occur.

America is in trouble--I think a lot of us would agree with that. But this election won't even begin to fix it. America needs a Presidential race between two or three people that appeal to a wide variety of folks--sadly we are forced to vote for the lesser of two evils.

 
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