From: John Clark (jonkc@worldnet.att.net)
Date: Mon Oct 11 1999 - 08:44:20 MDT
In most schools the pay a teacher receives is not based on how well he
teaches but on how many degrees he has, and not just any degree,
only particularly silly ones in something caused "education" count.
This leads to absurdities such as a Nobel Prize winner in chemistry not being
allowed to teach high school chemistry. The policy also maximizes the wrong
thing, not smart kids but just the amount of parchment a teacher possesses.
I'm almost embarrassed to point out the obvious but the only way to tell a good
teacher from a bad one is to see how well they teach. Have all students in
a given grade take a standardized test, this would really be a test of
the teachers not the students. Teachers with students in the top 20%
would get a raise, those in the top 5% would get a big raise, those in the
top 1% would get rich, those in the bottom 20% would get a pay cut ,
those in the bottom 5% would get a big pay cut and those in the
bottom 1% would get fired.
I'm sure the National Education Association would really hate this
policy and that's pretty good evidence it's a good idea
John K Clark jonkc@att.net
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