Let me get my biases out the way. My wife's a teacher and she's on the chopping block here in San Diego (despite the fact that she's awesome at her job and loved by her principal, kids and parents).
With that said, if you listen to the school board meetings all they are pretty much talking about is how to house kids. Actual education and improving it is not discussed because they have so little money they are just trying to figure out how to keep the doors open.
And that really sucks because there is a lot of good critical thought going on in education about how to educate in the 21st century - and it's all being ignored.
My fantasy would be the following:
- Tax payers agree to fund education
- Teachers agree to do away with seniority and tenure and are flexible with pensions (it's pretty unrealistic to believe we can afford to keep pensions going).
- Districts open their books and agree to start focusing on education in the 21st century.
- Union actually cooperates and does right for children and all staff - not just the most senior staff. They also have to be willing to try new avenues of education.
Each group can receive something here if they are willing to compromise - and the end result would be a much better system.
- DC Warrior 2012-05-04 08:06:24 (68 views)
- gribble the mispost master 2012-05-03 11:43:03 (82 views)
