And who’s fault is it that administrators have little experience and is fast-tracked through the classroom? I assume it’s other administrators and teachers as well. If they can’t manage/police themselves, obviously tax payers want to have a say how things are being done.
Since they’re (administrators I assume) are also tax payer funded, I certainly would be FOR going after them and cleaning their issues up as well and all the issues you bring up.
Administrators make a TON of money I’ve noticed in the schools and I’d certainly be for getting rid of a lot of them and curbing back their benefits/pay unless there is progress/benefits in the classrooms for the kids/teachers.
Nothing should be shielded/off the table.
In regards to playing office politics/kiss ass to become an administrator…unfortunately, that’s just a fact of life in ALL business/life/home/family you name it. This will never go away, but that doesn’t mean good administrators with other like minded good administrators can’t play the same game and do positive changes. The notion that every single administrator is underqualified and a bane to all teachers can’t be real.
The message you present just consistently comes off as a teacher who blames administrators (upper management) for the ills of the system. If teachers don’t like the situation, go and run or get promoted as an administrator yourself and try new things and fix the problem. We wouldn’t be here discussing this if there weren’t such a big problem and since schools are still tax payer funded and we pay for it, outside people should have a greater say in what to do.
Even better is if all schools just became private and I can just get 10k and pay for it. If I choose to home school, maybe get direct tax credits or something so people can vote with their dollars.
For the “poor” smucks who can’t afford to pay in the inner city/schools, I guess they would just all close and consolidate and maybe that’s what should happen anyways. Not like many of these kids even want to be there.
All that said, it just sounds like the situation you are describing is older teachers (maybe equated to older/lazy workers in a company) with tenure are just whining that some new hire (maybe a new CEO) is trying to right the ship and fix things and just trying to roadblock the issue. Since these “employees” can’t be fired currently, there is bloat everywhere and costing us more and more.
Just seems like teachers don’t want to change and learn and keep current with best methods.[/quote]
Administrators get paid well because they have a lot on their plates and their jobs range from managing disciplinary issues, finances, accountability measures, compliance with a large number of rules and regulations related to different programs and student groups, site operations, personnel, public relations, etc. They deserve what they make, and I’m not blaming them for the ills of the system, either. I’m blaming the way the system is set up and the politics involved.
And you’re completely wrong about teachers not wanting to learn about superior teaching methods and materials. The problem is that many people will think an idea is “new and brilliant” when, in fact, it was tried decades ago and failed (but the “progressives” weren’t around to know about it because they were probably children themselves when these same ideas and materials were used before).
And while you would certainly like taxpayers to just hand you $10K to use at your own discretion, I’m sure most taxpayers would not want to just hand you their hard-earned money like that. Again, students have a right to an education at a public institution, they do not have a right, individually, to that money.
BTW, assuming you’ve worked in the corporate world, surely you’ve seen the “new genius” who was supposed to come in and improve everything…but then after managing to screw everything up and piss off all of the workers, they ride off into the sunset with a nicely padded bank account while all of the long-time, “lazy” workers are left with having to fix the mess that was created by this “genius.” Now picture this happening in a school setting with all of the various moving parts. It’s obvious why teachers will fight this, and they are very much within their rights to do so.
Try looking at a map of where the “good” and “bad” schools are, then see if you can connect the dots. It’s not teachers who determine which schools perform better or worse.
