Are Teachers Unions To Blame For Failing Schools?

[nitro]

I was listening to NPR last night, and I was very surprised to learn that of all the unions in the US, Education unions outnumber every other union by at least 25% ! This is a must listen for every US citizen:

http://www.wbur.org/npr/125019386

Given the awful sate of of eduction in the US, are unions at least partly to blame for the sad state of education in this country?

My own opinion on this is that educators do care, unions or not, but that there are two things missing from their ideology:

1) Educators don't know how to control a classroom so that real learning happens. Eventually they do get exasperated and do the minimum needed to educate the students.

2) They don't do enough things to connect the rote learning to what is happening at the frontiers of the subject. So if you are teaching math, invite a world class mathematician to give a lecture. If you are teaching Biology, invite Greg Venter to give a lecture. If you are learning Physics, invite Leonard Susskind to give a lecture. This should all be done from 6th grade on.

 

[Lethn]

We spend almost ten times as much on wars than we do on education and healthcare, we hire incompetent teachers and doctors, we have an economy that is based entirely on debt and over-spending and the education system itself is largely teaching academic bullshit to children that is gradually making generations stupider and stupider.

Blaming the unions is just a typical piece of neo-con propaganda bullshit designed to cover up the fact that the government as a whole has completely failed children everywhere, this isn't just a problem in the U.S it is in all western countries.

 

[indahook]

Money, they gobble it all up.

Once tenured they turn to lazy sacks of shit that do the minimum. I have friends that are high school teachers they just laugh and agree when I talk like that.

They know that they have it made no matter what. Wheres the motivation to excel when you are guaranteed retirement wages and bene`s?

So..

Unions mandate tenure - check
Unions mandate guaranted pension(50% and upwards of your property tax bill) - check
Unions mandate lifetime bene`s for the teacher and spouse - check

 

[fkbsuhites]

The fact that many public schools in wealthier communities graduate some of the finest scholars shows the bigger part of the problem is parental apathy.

Another fact are the Asian immigrant children who come out of the ghetto educational systems and go on to graduate from some of the finest colleges.

Another fact. Experimental charter schools prove Black and Hispanic kids taken out of failed ghetto public schools excel and go onto college when put in stricter environments.

Unions are a partial problem because bad teachers are difficult to kick out. However the major problem is cultural.

wealthy communities are full of wealthy individuals who gained their wealth by goal oriented discipline. Traits they pass onto their kids.

Asians have an almost fanatical OCD towards getting an education.

The core issue is societal and the cultural apathy towards education by the majority of the population.

If the average parents are losers, you can't expect any different from the kids. The parents have no respect for themselves or respect for other people. And it shows with the higher incidence of violence in schools. Their loser kids with their pants tied at the knees stabbing each other because they "looked wrong" at some girl.

 

[nickdes]

I think the NEA and democrats are to blame for our failed Education system. These Dems want to toss money at the system instead of allowing the system to hire people that want to teach. The Dems are only interested in brain washing the students with the socialistic agenda they have. barrack hussien obama ummm, ummm good!

 

[clacy]

Quote from fkbsuhites:

The fact that many public schools in wealthier communities graduate some of the finest scholars shows the bigger part of the problem is parental apathy.

Another fact are the Asian immigrant children who come out of the ghetto educational systems and go on to graduate from some of the finest colleges.

Another fact. Experimental charter schools prove Black and Hispanic kids taken out of failed ghetto public schools excel and go onto college when put in stricter environments.

Unions are a partial problem because bad teachers are difficult to kick out. However the major problem is cultural.

wealthy communities are full of wealthy individuals who gained their wealth by goal oriented discipline. Traits they pass onto their kids.

Asians have an almost fanatical OCD towards getting an education.

The core issue is societal and the cultural apathy towards education by the majority of the population.

If the average parents are losers, you can't expect any different from the kids. The parents have no respect for themselves or respect for other people. And it shows with the higher incidence of violence in schools. Their loser kids with their pants tied at the knees stabbing each other because they "looked wrong" at some girl.

I don't agree with much of what you post normally, but this is spot on.

There are many factors involved in setting the quality of our schools and parental involvement, discipline and support is probably the largest component.

 

[AAAintheBeltway]

It's tempting to blame unions but I believe they are only a part of the problem. The number one problem is cultural. Some groups just do not value education. Others, like asians, do. All the facilities and the best teachers cannot teach a kid who has no interest in learning and no motivation.

A close second is lack of discipline. Here we see the effect of liberals' obsession with dragging everyone down to the lowest common denominator, in the interest of "fairness." I know several outstanding, highly motivated teachers who got out of education because they couldn't teach in classrooms where punks could stand up and curse at them and threaten them and the administration would do nothing.

A third, and closely related to the above two, is pretending we can give everyone a good education. Some people don't want it or are too dumb to absorb it. Others are just troublemakers who ruin it for the other 95%. Unlike say europe, where they track kids onto an academic or trade school track after middle school, we pretend to give everyone a college prep education, but of course, we just end up throwing money away on the group that isn't interested.

 

[shfly]

Basically the blame belongs at home with the parents...The parents send the kids to school and want the school to all the work. Basically the same as letting the kids watch TV all afternoon, instead of being involved as a parent...

If you want your child to learn, to succeed, you as a parent MUST step up to the plate. Very simple, if you ask me...become involved.

I would not let the teachers/school bring up my kids. Expect dedication/hard work from your kids, and soon it's on autopilot. They WANT good grades...Funny how that works...And the rewards? Ivy league schools...and good jobs even in the Great Recession...

It's for the taking...but you gotta start early, not when the kid is 15 or 16...Start with a picture book when the kid is a baby, next they'll be reading before 1st grade...Limit television/computer etc.

It's so simple, yet so amazing we have all these failing kids...and it only cost a few minutes a day...

 

[PnL Rally]

The teachers unions are generally opposed to merit pay, so teachers are paid based on years of service, rather than classroom achievement. This pay system is a disincentive to anyone talented in math and science, since they can get higher paying jobs in other fields. This is the biggest problem I have with teachers unions.

I agree with previous posters that education quality has a lot to do with family attitudes, and there are a lot of really good public school districts.

 

[Lethn]

The reason people don't value education is because it's worthless and they can do without it, I consider it worthless. Especially after looking back I found that most of the stuff that was taught in school was utter lies and I've systematically filtered the useless crap out of my brain, I think the only useful stuff I really learned from shool was some french and maths.

Discipline doesn't work, you don't discipline children, it doesn't freaking work in the army either. You gain discipline through practice and training and it grows naturally, this also happens in every day things. I remember my dad telling me about this guy he knew was going on about how her daughter had moved into her own place and was all of a sudden doing all the normal things in a household that the parents did and how he wished she'd have done that before. If schools even bothered to adopt that kind of thinking then children would be growing up a tad less dumber than they are now.