Public Schooling

[slade]

A lack of competition, of a need to be better, has hurt schools.

1) Make school funding based on how many students are in class - $XXXX of dollars per student.
2) Let students choose there school - so that the best schools attract the most students... make it like business. Either you succeed or you fail as an adminstrator in getting the best teachers, best conditions, and giving the best education.
3) Supplement the schools that are failign by replacing there leaders and putting in someone who can succeed.


Its a business... being a school administrator does not mean you don't have to make the considerations that other business administrators do. We are where we are today because many administrators did not advance as quickly as they needed to, because they did not have any real competition to loose there customers - it was a sense of entitelment that has harmed us all.

1)very bad idea. the larger the class size, the harder it is to teach. my english teacher says if he gets 5 more students, he's just gonna split the class in half and teach half the class the first 30 minutes, and half the second. he says he can get more done that way, because its just so hard to deal with a large class. paying teachers based on class size is just giving incentive to have larger classes, which are more ineffective. maybe what would be better is to do #2, only accept a certain number of students, and pay the teachers based on how many students apply to go to the school.

while money certainly is a factor, all the money in the world can not overcome an incompotent teacher or a students apathy.

pay teachers more and there will be more competition, thus better teachers. and hand a kid a wad of cash and he'll pay attention but sometimes a teacher's pay wont influence their desire to work... from what ive heard, my math teacher used to own his own company, retired, and took up teaching for fun.

[Lohman446]

1)very bad idea. the larger the class size, the harder it is to teach. my english teacher says if he gets 5 more students, he's just gonna split the class in half and teach half the class the first 30 minutes, and half the second. he says he can get more done that way, because its just so hard to deal with a large class. paying teachers based on class size is just giving incentive to have larger classes, which are more ineffective. maybe what would be better is to do #2, only accept a certain number of students, and pay the teachers based on how many students apply to go to the school.
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Wrong... I bet you want to know why

A school that does not maintain a reasonable teacher to student ratio and class size will see its enrollment dwindling, and as a result its attendance - its customer base and they will loose money.

This is not a case where parents will look for a "bargain" because the government will be paying the school, and equal number for each student and identifying problem areas as they go. The best schools will have waiting lists, or will hire more teachers, and expand. Those schools that don't will have new administrations to turn them around.

Now.. before I say this next part let me say this. There are very many good teachers and adminstrators out there.

Tenure, for teachers and administrators is a joke. Where else can my job be to teach students, my training geared for it, claim professionalism and have half of my students (or more) fail? If half of my jobs at thsi shop came back I woudl have a problem. If I did nto fix the problem with the techs then the problem would be fixed through a change in management. I have heard too long teachers and adminstrators whine about there jobs and how hard they are. You know what, a lot of jobs are hard. Either quit or grow up and do what you need to to accomplish the job you are paid for. But tenure stops this... we allow failure to continue in our schools, we allow the teachers and adminstrators who would accept failure and look for reasons and why its everyones fault but theres. Do you wonder why when a student fails now they accept it - tell the world why its everyone elses faults but theres, and just fail again? Its the example we give them in the schools - this is dangerous, especially to those students who have no better example at home.

I'm sorry... but if we uninsulated teachers and adminsistrators from the free market, if we made there performance and pay to some degree proportional - the best schools would have more money and hire the best teachers, paying them better, etc. Then we would have a reason for them to succeed and like many other businesses creative solutions would be found.

Please note- that I have acknowledged the need for special circumstances for failing schools, to bring them out of the problems. Perhaps this is a base funding for them once problems are identified to help pull them from the funding - but it is not blindly handing them money and then just hoping things will get better.