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[W:#2026]School's out forever: Arizona moves "to kill public education" with new universal voucher law

Evaluate them on something other than just showing up for work? We love to blather on about how important teachers are yet we don’t hold them to any standards. Standardized test scores? Parent surveys? We just assume they’re doing their job effectively?
I can assure you teachers are evaluated in far more ways than showing up for work.
 
Maybe if the teachers unions would hold their teachers accountable there wouldn’t be a war on public education. Public schools are failing miserably but the teachers want raises tear after year. For what? Certainly not performance.

This drivel about teachers unions is a right wing talk radio myth. I’ve been hearing about it from the talk radio crowd for forty years.

The same people who spout this would not dare dream of imposing such an expectation on a police officer.
 
let's DO talk about evaluations and WHO should be performing them.
you posted that it is the union's responsibility to do so
that tells me you are unacquainted with labor law
those teachers' unions are OBLIGATED under federal law to represent the interests of the TEACHERS
it would make no sense for the same union which is obligated to represent the teacher in a disciplinary matter to also be responsible for bringing the charges AGAINST the teacher relative to a disciplinary matter and/or one having to do with performance

it would then seem that your argument is misplaced against the unions. you should instead be wailing against the failure of management to do its well paid jobs to identify inappropriate staff issues and then building a case that can effectively demonstrate that a case is there to be made
once that is in effect against the teacher it will then be time for the union to fulfill its fiduciary duty to represent the teacher facing the management allegations
if management fails to make a compelling, documented case against the teacher, management's action will probably (hopefully) fail

despite those above corrections made regarding your post, and who should do what, i agree with your presentation that teachers SHOULD be held accountable. so too, should management. the union should not be needed to perform management's job
I can't speak about unions, but I'm not aware of any unions who evaluate teachers. Teacher evaluations, to the best of my knowledge, are done by school administrators.
 
Evaluate them on something other than just showing up for work? We love to blather on about how important teachers are yet we don’t hold them to any standards. Standardized test scores? Parent surveys? We just assume they’re doing their job effectively?

Don't personally know any teachers, eh? I just went through the evaluation process this past year and it was............................. oy. Observations, assessments, evaluations, meetings to discuss, more observations, assessments, evaluations, more meetings to discuss, paperwork, paperwork and more paperwork.

Have you ever been in a class of kids taking a standardized test? Especially if they've already been through it at least one year. Of the 25 kids, 3 are really trying and getting super stressed out about it, 4 are super nerds who get it done correctly in a short period of time and the rest are hurrying through it without much thought because they know it has nothing to do with their grade.
 
Maybe if the teachers unions would hold their teachers accountable there wouldn’t be a war on public education. Public schools are failing miserably but the teachers want raises tear after year. For what? Certainly not performance.
The issue isn’t the teachers - it’s the kids and their parents. Voucher programs have been studied to death and there is no statistically significant improvement in academic performance. Face it. You can’t polish a turd with fancy private schools.
 
Don't personally know any teachers, eh? I just went through the evaluation process this past year and it was............................. oy. Observations, assessments, evaluations, meetings to discuss, more observations, assessments, evaluations, more meetings to discuss, paperwork, paperwork and more paperwork.

Have you ever been in a class of kids taking a standardized test? Especially if they've already been through it at least one year. Of the 25 kids, 3 are really trying and getting super stressed out about it, 4 are super nerds who get it done correctly in a short period of time and the rest are hurrying through it without much thought because they know it has nothing to do with their grade.
But, hey, we standardize test a grand total of one time a year, so it makes PERFECT sense to evaluate children and teachers on an entire year's worth of lessons from one test, a test that teachers have no foreknowledge of what will be tested. Right?
 
But, hey, we standardize test a grand total of one time a year, so it makes PERFECT sense to evaluate children and teachers on an entire year's worth of lessons from one test, a test that teachers have no foreknowledge of what will be tested. Right?

Makes perfect sense to me!

Even if admin uses the ongoing assessments throughout the year, there is so much about our students that are beyond our control. For example, I've had years where my class is incredibly well-behaved, great parents, great communication -- those tests scores were understandably higher because there weren't behavior distractions in the class, high levels of stress caused by other students/parents, etc. And then I've had years where half of my class have parents who are on drugs and, therefore, have massive behavior issues and emotional trauma, let alone parents who don't communicate and don't care. Those test scores are going to be lower not because I was a worse teacher that year, but because of the parents of those students being total asswipes to their children.
 
But, hey, we standardize test a grand total of one time a year, so it makes PERFECT sense to evaluate children and teachers on an entire year's worth of lessons from one test, a test that teachers have no foreknowledge of what will be tested. Right?
espacially since you had no hand in the selection of the students you taught nor at what academic level they had attained when they first entered your class room
 
[snip]
Last Friday, while the country reeled from the Supreme Court overturning Roe v Wade, Arizona made history of a different sort. Legislators in the Grand Canyon State passed a universal school voucher bill that, once signed by Gov. Doug Ducey, will become the most wide-reaching school privatization plan in the country.

In his January State of the State address, Ducey called on Arizona lawmakers to send him bills that would "expand school choice any way we can," and the Republican-dominated legislature obliged, delivering last Friday's bill, which will open a preexisting program for Empowerment Scholarship Accounts (ESAs) up to the entire state. In practice, the law will now give parents who opt out of public schools a debit card for roughly $7,000 per child that can be used to pay for private school tuition, but also for much more: for religious schools, homeschool expenses, tutoring, online classes, education supplies and fees associated with "microschools"

"Every red state in the country should follow [Ducey's] lead," since the law "gives every family a right to exit any public school that fails to educate their children or reflect their values."

From Rhode Island, anti-CRT activist Nicole Solas, a fellow with the right-wing Independent Women's Forum, tweeted, "You know what happens when you abuse people? People leave you. Bye, public school."

"The Republican universal voucher system is designed to kill public education," tweeted former Arizona House Rep. Diego Rodriguez. "OUR nation's greatness is built on free Public schools. The GOP goal is to recreate segregation, expand the opportunity gap, and destroy the foundation of our democracy."

"I think it's a very serious mistake and the result will be that, within a decade, Arizona will have a very, very poorly educated adult population," added Carol Corbett Burris, executive director of the Network for Public Education. "Maybe that's the game."

"One of the things people never fully comprehend is how far privatization advocates want to take things," he said. "They want to get rid of all public funding for education. Eventually vouchers will die off too." What will remain, he argues, will be a self-funded primary education system, funded by a lending market much as colleges are. Or as Lewis says, a "system of haves and have-nots."

[snip]

At this point, every post I put in the breaking news section feels like I'm documenting the rise of Christian Nationalism. It seems like every day...a little piece of our society is stripped away. A little closer to their vision of theocratic fascism. On it's own...this is not a huge deal. But take in the context of current events this is just one more chip away.
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They only fired him after the video came out. He had an Antifa flag up in his classroom, so that was obviously condoned.
I don't know one teacher at any of the three high schools that I have taught at in two countries in over twenty years who has anything political up in their rooms beyond pictures of Gandhi or the Tank Man or Rosie the Riveter. I think we had one teacher that had a rainbow flag up but she ran the school's LGBTQ group.
And it's not "just a teacher". It's teacher after teacher after teacher and something only happens when videos show controversy and people speak out. They aren't hiding this stuff.
So you also think that there is a systemic problem with cops arresting innocent people, lying on police reports, shooting people, etc etc etc as well then. Good.


I have no idea if that video is true and after she mentioned that "Satan is after the kids" I feel pretty confident in calling that all bullshit.
 
The annual Best Countries Report, conducted by US News and World Report, BAV Group, and the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, reserves an entire section for education. The report surveys thousands of people across 78 countries, then ranks those countries based upon the survey's responses. The education portion of the survey compiles scores from three equally-weighted attributes: a well-developed public education system, would consider attending university there, and provides top-quality education. As of 2021, the top ten countries based on education rankings are:

Countries with the Best Educational Systems - 2021 Best Countries Report*​

  1. The United States
  2. The United Kingdom
  3. Germany
  4. Canada
  5. France
  6. Switzerland
  7. Japan
  8. Australia
  9. Sweden
  10. The Netherlands
@Groogrux

Guess not...
 
Culture. The culture in the US doesn't value education as much as other nations.

So are you saying these other countries have a better culture and that better culture lets them better fund and organize their education systems?
 
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I think Americans got lazy post WWII. We were the only show in town, because the rest of the developed world was blown up. We were living on easy street and didn't think that would change. Now those other nations have rebuilt and other nations who weren't developed are now, or are up and coming.

That's not all of it but I think that plays a big role.

In 2017, MacLean's Magazine published "The American Dream has moved to Canada," an update of "How Canada Stole the American Dream" from 2008 - the articles may be dated, but the facts remain the basically same!

1) LIFE EXPECTANCY
- Canadians live 2.5 years longer than their American counterparts

2) INCARCERATION - Canadians are 6X less likely to be in a jail or prison than US citizens

3) QUALITY OF LIFE - The World Economic Forum ranked Canadians as the 6th happiest people in the world, while Americans lagged behind at 13th

4) EDUCATION - 59% of Canadians have a post-secondary education compared to 46% in the US (tuition in Canada is far more affordable)

5) EMPLOYMENT - with a better educated work force, Canada's rate of employment is 4% above the US

6) HOME OWNERSHIP - home ownership is 5% higher with Canadian financial institutions subject to stricter government oversight which resulted in the nation avoiding much of the "sub-prime" loan meltdown in 2008

7) WORKING HOURS/HOLIDAYS - on average, Canadians work 80 hours a year less than their American counterparts and receive an additional 3 days in holidays

8) "LAND OF THE FREE" -- the conservative American "Cato Institute" published its international "Human Freedom Index ranking Canada as the 6th freest people in the world, with the US at 23rd, - just behind Poland!

9) ECONOMIC FREEDOM - the conservative "Heritage Foundation" ranked Canada 7th and the U.S. 17th for economic freedom

10) "FREEDOM OF SPEECH - despite its 1st Amendment,"Reporters Without Borders" scores Canada 18th for press freedom and America 41st

11) ECONOMIC EQUALITY- UPWARD MOBILITY - the “Gini Co-efficient” has ranked American citizens as having less economic equality than their Canadian counterparts
- children born into Canada's poorest quartile are 2x more likely to achieve "THE AMERICAN DREAM" by elevating themselves to the wealthiest quartile
- despite the rhetoric, the prospects for upward mobility are limited, where most children don't progress much beyond the economic circumstances of their parents
*********************************************************************************************************************************
1) The average American works longer hours and take fewer holidays than their Canadian counterparts but this isn't reflected in their quality of life - in terms of life expectancy, access to healthcare, education, employment opportunities, home ownership, personal safety, upward mobility .....

2) Americans don't need to "double-down" and worker harder, they should be demanding a more economically and socially equitable society where the 99% share in the nation's prosperity!

3) Americans have been programmed to dismiss as "socialism" Canada's commitment the nation's commitment to institutions, such as its public healthcare system - whatever its deficiencies, the fact remains that it has achieved better outcomes than the US (lower pharmaceutical costs, extending life expectancy) while devoting significantly less of its GDP to medical care!
 
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The issue isn’t the teachers - it’s the kids and their parents. Voucher programs have been studied to death and there is no statistically significant improvement in academic performance. Face it. You can’t polish a turd with fancy private schools.
What are some of the studies?

Private schools outperform public schools almost universally. Yes, a good portion of that is due to parents and kids who want to go to school, and the ability of the schools to focus most of their resources on education, but they do better. Why shouldn't families who make less be able to take the tax dollars allocated to them from the state and go to a better school?

And most aren't 'fancy'. Lots of private schools service middle class families, and doe it on a shoestring.
 
Public school is great for middle of the road students. It fails students in either end of the intelligence spectrum.

In my experience that is true for the kids on the higher than average side, but isn't true for the kids on the lowest end. We literally spend millions of dollars targeted at helping those kids who need the most academic help. The problem isn't the schools or teachers or admins or curriculum -- it's the parents. Give me almost no money and a class full of kids who are reading below or way below grade level who have parents who are interested and involved and almost all of those kids will be at grade level, above grade level or close to meeting grade level by the end of the year.

Thinking back over my years as a teacher, I would say 98% of the kids who are the furthest behind have the worst parents.
 
Where I live, of the top 5 performing school districts, 3 are public, 2 are private. One of the main reasons why private schools perform well is that if you are shelling out thousands of dollars or more a year for your kid's education, you are going to be involved in their education because you got a lot of skin the game. When you give out vouchers, you take people's skin out of the game. The taxpayer foots the bill for your kid's private education.

It is funny to me that free market zealots recognize this with every other aspect of the economy, that people need skin in the game, that if you shelling out your own hard earned money for something, you have an incentive to seek out the best and most competitive product, and make sure that you are served well. There is a lot of truth to that, yet for some reason many of these free market zealots don't seem to think that applies to education. They seem to think the best route for education is just hand out free money for parents to purchase private school tuition with, regardless of how the school district those parents live in is performing.
 
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This drivel about teachers unions is a right wing talk radio myth. I’ve been hearing about it from the talk radio crowd for forty years.

The same people who spout this would not dare dream of imposing such an expectation on a police officer.
Oooh! Oooh! I would! I would!
 
Public school is great for middle of the road students. It fails students in either end of the intelligence spectrum.
It is great for any student that tries... that is the variable that most are missing about education today.
 
Makes perfect sense to me!

Even if admin uses the ongoing assessments throughout the year, there is so much about our students that are beyond our control. For example, I've had years where my class is incredibly well-behaved, great parents, great communication -- those tests scores were understandably higher because there weren't behavior distractions in the class, high levels of stress caused by other students/parents, etc. And then I've had years where half of my class have parents who are on drugs and, therefore, have massive behavior issues and emotional trauma, let alone parents who don't communicate and don't care. Those test scores are going to be lower not because I was a worse teacher that year, but because of the parents of those students being total asswipes to their children.
This is exactly correct. And too many people simply don't understand this.
 
What are some of the studies?

Private schools outperform public schools almost universally. Yes, a good portion of that is due to parents and kids who want to go to school, and the ability of the schools to focus most of their resources on education, but they do better. Why shouldn't families who make less be able to take the tax dollars allocated to them from the state and go to a better school?

And most aren't 'fancy'. Lots of private schools service middle class families, and doe it on a shoestring.
I'll present you the same challenge I've presented others:

Johnny lives at home with three siblings (two brothers and one sister). Dad is in jail, mom is constantly hooking up and staying overnight with men who are providing her drugs. Johnny has no family support, is responsible for his siblings, has little to no food in the house, and virtually no time for the homework he doesn't want to do in the first place.

Johnny goes to public school and barely passes. Please tell me how sending him to a private school is going to improve Johnny's education, when dad will still be in jail, Mom will still be doing drugs and hooking up with random men, there still will be little to no food in the house, and there still will be no one to make Johnny do his homework he doesn't want to do because he's busy babysitting his siblings.

Please tell me how the private school will make Johnny a better student.
 
In my experience that is true for the kids on the higher than average side, but isn't true for the kids on the lowest end. We literally spend millions of dollars targeted at helping those kids who need the most academic help. The problem isn't the schools or teachers or admins or curriculum -- it's the parents. Give me almost no money and a class full of kids who are reading below or way below grade level who have parents who are interested and involved and almost all of those kids will be at grade level, above grade level or close to meeting grade level by the end of the year.

Thinking back over my years as a teacher, I would say 98% of the kids who are the furthest behind have the worst parents.
This. 100% this. This cannot be stressed enough.

That's why I always take such issue with people criticizing public education. They do it because of factors which have nothing to do with teachers or the schools themselves. Are there bad schools and bad teachers? Sure. There's no profession where there's no people who are bad at their jobs. But, more often than not, the biggest issue is with society, in particular parents. But no one EVER wants to address that.
 
That isn't true. Some private schools out perform public schools and some public schools out perform private schools.
My father taught over 30 years in a public school that certainly wasn't anywhere close to failing, but certainly wasn't the highest performing either. He has since taught at two private schools. He has said on multiple occasions the academic rigor at the public school was much more than at the private schools. At his current private school, he says the kids wouldn't crumble if they had to do the work his public school kids did.

Like you said, it just depends on the schools.
 
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