Teacher World

         Students from Holmes Elementary School in Miami

Okay, let’s talk turkey about Teach for America and its impact on improving the lowest performing schools.

First, with a crippled economy and college graduates facing huge obstacles in landing jobs after school, Teach for America is receiving some renewed attention. And why wouldn’t it? Corps members earn teacher salaries, and at the same time, some of their federal student loans are forgiven. Quite a draw for graduates in this tight job market! In fact, applications to join the corps members are sky high.

On top of that, some school districts like one north of downtown Miami are actively working to fill their staffs with Teach for America corps members.

Julian Davenport, an assistant principal at Holmes Elementary in Miami, said, “These are the lowest performing schools, so we need the strongest performing teachers.” Three-fifths of this school’s staff come from Teach for America.

And it is estimated that by 2015, due to a $50 million federal grant, recruits from Teach for America could make up one-quarter of all new teachers in 60 of the nation’s highest need school districts. Here in Ohio, Governor Kasich signed a bill in April which opened the door for Teach for America teachers to begin working in Ohio schools by the 2012-2013 school year. And the program is also expanding internationally.

So, what is the problem, you might ask? Well first, Teach for America has had mixed results in terms of teacher efficacy and career longevity. According to statistics, these teachers perform about as effectively as other inexperienced teachers. But that isn’t saying much, since novice teachers tend to be less successful in the classroom than more experienced teachers. Additionally, most of these corps members leave the teaching profession within five years.

Using its own review of external research regarding their members, Teach for America concludes that its members achieve student gains that are “at least as great as that of other new teachers,” with some studies showing they did better, and others showing they did worse. Teach for America does not release data to the public regarding information they gather on how their teachers are performing.  “We just don’t feel it’s responsible to show,” the program’s developer, Wendy Kopp said. “There are so many flaws in our system.”

But one finding that is consistent is the program’s high turnover rate. The organization reports that 33 percent of its graduates are still teaching, but in many districts, turnover rates are much higher. North Carolina, for example, reported that after 5 years, only 7 percent of Teach for America corps members were still teaching in the state.

Kopp and those at Teach for America argue that turnover rates are high in general across low-income schools, which is true, but among other teacher preparation programs, theirs has one of the highest turnover rates.

The other huge concern with Teach for America is the limited training and experience they have received before being thrust into a classroom. This inexperience and lack of training, critics say, perpetuates the same inequalities that Teach for America is supposed to eradicate.

Kati Haycock, president of The Education Trust, which advocates on behalf of low-income and minority children, and a longtime supporter of TFA, said, “There’s no question that they’ve brought a huge number of really talented people in to the education profession.” But, she added, “Nobody should teach in a high poverty school without having already demonstrated that they are a fabulous teacher. For poor kids, education has to work every single year.”

For me, that is one of the major issues I have with Teach for America. I don’t care how intelligent these graduates are; without proper training and intensive classroom experience with students to learn how to communicate that knowledge to kids in a way that they will understand, you should not be in a classroom. Period! And there is no way that can be accomplished in one field experience, which is apparently all corps members get.

Let’s get real! These “teachers” aren’t being placed in schools where conditions are advantageous for instruction. They are being placed in some of the toughest schools which have a record of extremely low performance. I question how effective experienced teachers can be in these schools, let alone these novice young people.

I am sure that there are some naturally good teachers in Teach for America who are able to eventually overcome their lack of preparation and become excellent teachers. Please don’t think I am denigrating these young people, or their desire to make a difference in the schools where they are placed. I applaud their efforts, but I don’t feel they are being given the opportunity to become awesome teachers before they are zapped into a classroom with no real preparation or tools of the trade.

Let’s face it, if Teach for America was as effective as it claims, why aren’t more schools turning around when these teachers are placed there? And why do so many of these young people quickly gravitate to other careers, abandoning the students who need good teachers?

Expand Teach for America? Work out the problems that keep the program from being truly effective before expanding something that seems to be rather mediocre at best. Could it be a successful program? Absolutely! Is it currently successful? You be the judge.

Changes in Teaching, Educational Reform, low-performing schools, Teacher Education, Teacher-World's Blog Teach for America, teacher efficacy, teacher training, Wendy Kopp

After spending quite some time reading a variety of articles both for and against the issue of merit pay for teachers, I feel, as all teachers should, the need to weigh-in on this important issue. Especially as President Barack Obama plugged teacher bonuses based on student achievement in the first education policy speech of his presidency.

We all know that in education, as in any profession, there are employees who produce average work with average to little success, and are unmotivated to do much more. A common fallacy in the teaching profession is that it is predominately the veteran teachers who fit this scenario as they have become burned out and are simply waiting to retire. While I do not deny that I have seen my fair share of this condition, I must also adamantly state that this attitude has no age requirement. I have seen the same attitude in teachers fresh out of college, and some who have a few years under their belt. In teaching, as in any profession, our labor force ranges from the dedicated, hard-working, and tireless to the “I’ll-do-the-bare-minimum”, and various stages in between. The difference between the business and education world is that our teachers’ unions, which protect us in a multitude of important ways making our work places fairer and safer places to work, also do our profession the disservice of fighting to protect teachers, both young and old, who legitimately deserve to be let go. In the business world, job retention is directly related to job performance. If our unions did not work so diligently to protect teachers whose performance necessitated their being weeded out, does it not stand to reason that we would be left with a higher caliber of teachers who, by that very definition, are all deserving of merit pay?

I propose that unions should establish strict and multi-layered guidelines for teacher dismissal and should ensure that these guidelines are followed to the letter. But when thorough documentation proves a teacher’s unwillingness or inability to take the necessary steps to improve their teaching skills after a methodical, multifaceted evaluation process established by the union, it becomes counterproductive and hurts a school system when its union fights for that teacher. Allowing the administration to release these teachers from their contract would ultimately create a higher caliber school system which encourages respect from the community and makes it far more likely for these community members to support levies that pay all teachers in these schools the salary they deserve.

Changes in Teaching, Funding Education, High Caliber Schools, Teacher Education, Teacher's Unions, Teacher-World's Blog job performance, job retention, merit pay, Obama's education policy, school levies, teacher evaluation, teacher salary, Teacher's Unions, veteran teachers

The costs of a 4 year college degree can be a staggering realization for high school graduates wishing to enter the teaching profession. Earning $40,000 a year sounds like a great number, but not necessarily when you have $60,000 to $80,000 of debt hanging over your head after earning your bachelor’s degree and teaching certification.

However, what many young high school graduates, and individuals who have yet to enter college are learning, is that cheaper options are popping up all over. Community colleges have offered associate degree programs that are significantly less expensive than the typical 4-year program. You can earn your associate’s degree, knock off two years of exhorbitant tuition, and be well on  your way toward your bachelor’s degree.

In addition, there are a few states where community colleges are starting to offer baccalaureate degree programs as well. These programs typically demand similar price per credit tuition as associate degree programs while offering degrees in teaching, nursing, health administration, and more.

“Miami Dade College (a community college) offers bachelor’s degrees in teaching and nursing and public safety management, and will soon add engineering technology, film production and others.”
- New York Times, May 2nd, 2009

Of course four-year colleges are strongly against community colleges adoption of baccalaureate options. There are various reasons for their disagreement with this advancement in community colleges such as that community colleges will not provide quality education. However, most will be able to see through this argument as an attempt to hang on to a monopoly held by over-priced universities.

So, as a person with a high school education looking to enter the field of education, cheaper options for education are on the rise and will most likely start bringing down tuition costs across the board as enrollment numbers start dwindling at the higher priced universities.

The next step for those looking at their teaching degree options is to contact as many schools as possible, make a spreadsheet of costs, pluses and minuses for each university (online or campus), and set yourself up to make the best choice both economically and for your lifestyle. Even as the economic picture looks bleak across the country, rest assured that in tough times like these you will begin seeing some of the greatest deals of your lifetime, even in education!

Funding Education, Teacher Education

It is thought that by 2015 there will be a math and science teacher shortfall of 280,000! A staggering number made even more dire when we begin to understand what our country needs to prosper in the future… innovation.

“Science is more essential for our prosperity, our security, our health, our environment, and our quality of life than it has ever been before.”
- Barack Obama, April 27th, 2009 – National Academy of Sciences Speech

With energy being both an avenue for new job creation and prosperity, it currently is a sector that has severely weakened our national safety and our economic stability. The healthcare industry has comes leap and bounds over the past 50 years with cures and technological advancements, but it is also a system that has neglected a huge sector of American people.

It is understandable why science and math has taken a back seat in the minds of so many Americans. There seemed to be little place for advancement when those who are running our current system have been determined to halt innovation. Oil companies and health insurance companies have lobbied shamelessly to halt progression, however, this is changing quickly. Aside from companies invested in technology and advancement in industries such as healthcare, those who stand to gain a great deal are math and science teachers.

Incentives for becoming a math or science teacher will become much greater in the near future. Salaries will likely increase, opportunities will of course be plentiful with a shortfall of 280,000 teachers, and, of course, emotional rewards are always on the top of the list for those who make a positive impact on the lives of young people.

So, get out there and learn how you can enter the field as a math or science teacher. Learn how you can start earning your teaching degree today.

Funding Education, Teacher Education

Without a doubt, having the ability to express yourself through the english language is a skill that is highly important. However, is the skill of writing perhaps losing it’s importance? What? Take another subject; physics for example. In physics, students who excel and enjoy the study and application of physics can easily learn more about how this field can eventually turn into a career. Perhaps the student might work for NASA, an aerospace company, or transition into an engineering field.

So, what can a student who is talented in expressing themselves through the written word look forward to? Perhaps they can write a book… hardly a dream that will likely turn into a lucrative career. The “go to job” for those who are talented at extracting ideas and stories from the mundane struggles of daily living has been contributing to a news organization, a reporter, a journalist, a columnist.

The problem now is that this industry is contracting at a frightening pace. The medium of print media is dying a painful death while online news sources have yet to employ the volume of writers that have existed in print media organizations.

So, what does the english teacher tell his/her star pupil? “I know you are a fantastic writer, but unless you are one of the lucky few who can piece together a fantastic novel with a highly marketable subject plot, you might want to keep looking for another talent you might possess.”

“The American Journalism Review estimates that 15 percent of the nation’s newspaper newsroom jobs were lost in 2008 as news consumerscontinued to gravitate to online sources and as traditional revenue streams dried up; so far this year, major newspapers in Denver and Seattle have folded altogether.”
- New York Times, April 14th, 2009

Now, these can seem like frightening times for english teachers. Of course you know what you are teaching must be valuable; however, you simply can’t put a finger on how developing proper written communication skills can be as lucrative as it once was.

But… don’t kick yourself too soon. The art of writing and the jobs stemming from the talent is certainly not dead. As a matter of fact, right now communication across the globe is on hyper-speed. The same technology that appears to be killing the writers’ largest employer is also creating an infrastructure that should eventually sustain the livelihoods of many more. The technology is there, yet the application and connection to the world is constantly being refined.

Vocabulary is changing, writing structures are altering just enough to make the change from the front page of a newspaper to the landing page directed from a google search query.

So, yes, these are certainly awkward times when an english teacher may be at a loss for words when a student asks where they might be able to apply their writing talents once graduating from college. However, rest assured, communication is as vital as ever and jobs that revolve around the written word will again be a viable option for your students.

A great step to take now is to learn more about developing your teaching techniques and deepening your teaching toolbox. Request information from schools offering master’s degree programs in education.

Teacher Education

When thinking back on particular times in our lives, we can all single out certain situations or events that have had a lasting impact on our behavior. Perhaps it was a time when you struck out during a little league baseball game and  you felt terrible, like you let down everyone. After that moment, you decided you no longer wanted to play that game. Or maybe you wrote an essay in middle school about a book you had read over winter vacation and your teacher praised your talented work. From that moment on, your writing took on a greater meaning and the classes you enjoyed the most were those that let you display your blossoming talent.

From a teacher’s perspective, these moments have significant impact in how a particular class moves through scheduled material and graduates with the knowledge necessary to perform in the desired manner. In each class, there are those students who have the ability and confidence necessary to quickly devour material and grasp concepts. And, in each class, there are those students who seem to have a terribly difficult time grappling with concepts, and in turn, slow down the progress of an entire class.

Some researchers believe that a significant portion of students who are under-performing are doing so because they have a lack of confidence in themselves, experience great amounts of stress in class and feel enough fear of failure to paralyze their ability to perform.

“The researchers, led by Geoffrey L. Cohen, a social psychologist at the University of Colorado, had seventh graders in suburban Connecticut schools perform the assignment three to five times through that school year. It asked them to simply choose from a list which values were most important to them — including athletic ability, sense of humor, creativity and being smart — and to write why those values were so important…

“The idea is that a bad experience early in school can have lasting effects, and that if we can do something in that crucial window, it could alter the student’s trajectory slightly and change the arc of their experience over time,” Dr. Cohen said. The assignment, he said, reminded students that their entire self-worth was not riding on a single test result.”
- New York Times, April 16th, 2009

So, perhaps if teachers learn a few more tricks like this to help break down barriers that were built in the absence of self-esteem, we may slowly see student performance creep upwards.

From a common sense perspective, this makes a great deal of sense. We all have had dreams in our lives. Many of those dreams we never reached simply because we never tried. And why did we never try? Because we were afraid of failing. In a public education system that is desperately trying to meet accountability standards, perhaps we are missing the fundamental reasons why some students fail and others succeed. Maybe a touch of psychology can help all of us teachers make a greater impact in the lives of our students.

You can find information about gaining advanced education deepening your teaching toolbox by earning a master’s degree in education.

Teacher Education

Well, it appears that the future of student lending is still very much up in the air. In an effort to make student lending available to a larger, more economically diverse population, President Obama has introduced a plan to overhaul lending practices. These efforts should result in a savings of $94 billion over the next 10 years.

However, these changes present a few dilemmas ethically and have sparked much resistance in the private lending sector. From one perspective, it appears Obama is trying to flex the muscle of his administration and expand the role of government, yet again. On the other hand, one could say he is simply trying to refine a system that has been stealing dollars from tax payers and poor students to line the pockets of bank executives (yes, a theme we are all familiar with now).

What this program will most likely be doing is capture the profits of banks (student lenders) coming from government subsidized lending. Since the subsidized lending system has essentially eliminated all risk for banks, one could very easily make an argument for doing away with private student lending all together. They are currently acting as the typical middle man, but taking practically 100% of the profits associated with student loans.

“Under the subsidized loan program, the government pays lenders like Citigroup, Bank of America and Sallie Mae, with both the subsidy and the maximum interest rate for borrowers set by Congress.”
- New York Times, April 12th, 2009

So, with arguments piling up that we’ve all heard numerous times before, “Government expansion”, “Loss of jobs in the industry”, the public is having less and less sympathy for big banks. Perhaps the fear of an expanding government is paling to the idea that we must reform the student lending industry, and financial system at large, in order to move ahead in a more efficient matter. Honestly, what’s the point of keeping jobs that provide little to no productive service to the country?

From a prospective teacher’s perspective, or a current teacher contemplating the commencement of a master’s degree program in education, loan opportunities will continue to be there for when you decide to earn your teaching degree. In fact, in the future, these loans may even get cheaper and more accessible.

Funding Education, Teacher Education

The landscape of education is destined to change. With baby boomers reaching retirement age in mass numbers over the coming decade, the public education system will experience a tremendous shock to its system. In the past, the public education system has been able to trudge through with inefficient teacher recruitment and retention practices, awful pay, and an overall lack of political interest.

While young teacher attrition rates continue to climb and an unprecedented wave of retirement looms over us, our educational system has no choice but to file chapter 11 and restructure.

“Over 50 percent of the nation’s teachers and principals are Baby Boomers.  During the next four years we could lose a third of our most accomplished educators to retirement.  The wave of departures will peak during the 2010‐11 school year, when over one hundred thousand veteran teachers could leave.  In less than a decade more than half of today’s teachers – 1.7 million – could be gone.”
- National Commission on Teaching and America’s Future, April 2009 article

For new teachers, or those considering digging deeper into their profession as educators by earning a master’s degree in education, this upcoming shake-up in the world of public education may be a good thing.

We are currently barely hanging on with our antiquated teacher recruitment and retention practices. Most likely, what is holding our system together with some semblance of productivity is our older generation of teachers. The baby boomers are individuals who entered the profession when the name “Teacher” had the connotation of a proper, respectable profession. And with such a distinction combined with the idea that a teacher can have a significant, direct impact on the world, many highly capable individuals were entering the profession.

However, over the last twenty years as this distinction has wavered and plunged into obscurity, much fewer highly capable individuals have thought of teaching as an attractive career possibility. So, it looks like the coming few years could be rather bleak as a large percentage of teachers retire and take with them an even larger percentage of the industry’s true talent.

So, is there a bright side, you ask? Of course! With the reality of our current educational system finally catching up with us (similar to the absurd leveraging of debt that hurled us into our financial crisis), we are in the midst of reaping what we have sowed. It will be increasingly apparent that the work environment will need to change so that new teachers will have much better experiences and be enticed to stay in there chosen profession. Whether this change will occur with greater salaries, greater mentoring programs, more contemporary assessment practices, or perhaps new methods of management stolen from other, more productive industries, be assured, it will change.

With all this being said, you might ask yourself who would want to enter this profession?! Well, those who want to make a change in a child’s life would. When all is considered, now is certainly a much better time to consider entering the teaching profession than any time over the last 20 years. We are poised to make significant changes within public education, and at this point, any change will certainly have to be a positive one for those entering the profession. We have no other choice!

If you are interested in becoming a teacher, request information from schools offering teaching degree programs.

Teacher Education

Somehow it appears we are losing the battle…

“Only 53% of American adults believe capitalism is better than socialism… Adults under 30 are essentially evenly divided: 37% prefer capitalism, 33% socialism, and 30% are undecided.” – April 9th, 2009 Rasmussen Report

These are absolutely staggering numbers and should frighten the socks off anyone who sees them. We should all be asking ourselves, “How could this possibly be happening?”.

Is this a result of consequential disgust over the behavior of the wealthy and what can essentially be seen as the monopolizing stranglehold of a financial industry on the nation? Or perhaps is this a result of teachers who haven’t an idea why America provides the most opportunity and highest quality of life than any other country in the world?

Somehow a sense of entitlement mixed with a lack of interest has permeated through our younger generation, and most likely, a large portion of teachers have encouraged this mentality either by being too frightened to express that greed is a necessary evil when living in a system that encourages innovation and the pursuit of the “American Dream” or simply, are morons themselves.

However, as these facts are truly frightening, some school districts are taking steps to encourage students to look at the world in a different light. The way to do this is to begin opening students’ eyes to possibilities of being creative, to being involved with some form of innovation and free thought. Essentially, this is what’s missing for most young people who believe socialism is better than capitalism or access to a free market economy. They simply have not had the opportunity to dream big for themselves or to have had a vision of how they could be a spoke in the wheel of a fast moving, global economy.

In New York, a handful of schools are requiring seniors to complete senior projects. These projects can be in essentially any field, but what they all similarly represent is the value of hard work, adaptability, and problem solving abilities.

Perhaps this is the area where teachers and administrators should be focusing. Somehow connections need to be drawn between students’ creativity, potential and the infrastructure our economic system provides.

Learn how to have a bigger impact on your students by advancing your education. Request information from schools offering masters degree programs in education.

Teacher Education

This is a rather difficult and obscure topic. One that is certainly controversial as well, due to the long list of completely varied yet confident explanations people may give.

To get a good idea of what you should look for in a graduate level education today, you will need to do two things. First, you will need to recognize the biggest obstacles education is facing today. Secondly, you will need to have a firm grasp on the basic, underlying concepts for the existance of public education.

To begin with, some of the greatest problems facing education today have to do with the disconnect between our educational curriculum and the jobs that will be in existence once students reach the workforce.

“Knowing what education should be doing in an age in which people are likely to have more than 10 jobs by age 42, according to the U.S. Department of Labor, has greatly complicated matters. Further exacerbating the situation is the projection that the top 10 jobs that will be in demand for today’s students don’t yet exist, and will be using technologies that haven’t been invented to solve problems we don’t even know are problems yet.”
-Education Week, March 30th, 2009

With this in mind, how are we possibly going to correlate curriculum with definitive career paths? Answer: We’re not!

Now, before addressing this conundrum, let’s address the second idea necessary for choosing an appropriate master’s degree in education.

Back to basics… what are we really doing by educating our youth? Quick and easy answer, we are preparing our youth to take over the reigns of the superpower we call the “United States of America”. Now, to truly answer this question we would need a crazy woman who travels with a carnival and stares into a crystal ball; however, since we don’t have one of those on hand, we’ll take a different approach.

At the pace of change in our world due to our free market economy and ability to share information across the globe instantaneously, we know that the skills and knowledge that will be valuable 20 years from now, hasn’t even been invented. Therefore, we know the most important skill students should be endowed with is the ability to adapt and to be creative(innovation is key!).

So, conveniently it appears the answer to both necessary questions driving your research for a master’s in education can be wrapped up in one answer. To both tackle the problems facing us today and to satisfy the underlying concepts for the existence of education is simply… to teach students how to think critically.

As a teacher or one thinking of becoming a teacher, your education should be based around this concept. You need to learn how to teach students how to think critically. In other words, you need to learn how to endow your students with the ability to assess the world around them, to make rational and logical decisions and to create practical solutions.

Sounds simple, but of course, it is anything but simple. Somehow, you need to help foster creativity in a public education system that continues to cut funding for liberal arts in lieu of outdated mathematics. You need to create interest in a system that encourages teachers to force disconnected information into the minds of students. Truly a difficult task.

So, make sure you contact many different schools offering master’s degree programs in education, and learn which programs seem to be a fit for you.

Teacher Education