Month: November 2008

Dissents Of The Day

A reader writes:

Knocking teacher tenure is easy but simplistic. There would be some specific gains from eliminating tenure — getting rid of (or re-motivating) some deadwood.  But you’re ignoring the real systematic costs. Tenure is a form of compensation: it gives teachers job security and some degree of classroom autonomy. If you already think that teaching is not attracting enough quality candidates, why would you propose cutting compensation?  If you really believe in market economics, you have to grapple with the likely effects of making the job even less attractive than it already is.

There are also reasons why tenure should be attractive to anyone who is suspicious of big, centralized government.  As far as I can see, tenure — to the extent that it promotes classroom autonomy for teachers — is one of the few things cutting against the movement to turn our schools into federally- directed test-prep centers.  The relentless pressure to focus on short-term test-score improvement, even if it gives kids an impoverished understanding of what learning is and why they should ever want to pursue it, is killing my daughters’ school.  If tenure helps a few teachers resist that pressure, then more power to it.

Another reader adds: 

I have to disagree with you on your position on tenure. It isn’t that the tenure system is by any means perfect, but it is a fallacy to lay the problems of schools at the feet of that alone.

   

I will concede that there are a ton of teachers that I work with daily that have no business being teachers, but what people tend to forget is that teachers aren’t hired with  tenure. Teachers have to earn tenure through the merit you are claiming they should have; we are scrutinized for three years before it is given to us. So if your taxes are going to a crummy school full of bad teachers, then why is it the union get all the blame and not the administrators who grant unqualified or incompetent teachers tenure? It is the obligation of the union to go to bat for any member, certainly, but administrators can give a series of honest, forthright evaluations that lead to termination before the fourth year. Administrators made the judgment to keep these people and have more far-reaching effect on the collective culture and goals of a school. Busting unions does not eliminate this fact. If an administrator won’t eliminate a poor teacher when they can, how does giving them the opportunity to eliminate them when they normally can’t suddenly solve the problem? 

   

As much as I am loathe to admit it, teachers are the worker bees in the grand scheme of things. You just as you wouldn’t blame the soldiers for lack of discipline over his or her commanding officers, it might be worth looking into taking a look at how administrators manage and evaluate their staff.
 
Yet another:

 

The reality is that teachers are not dealing with adults or numbers on a spreadsheet or some sort of product. They are dealing with children, children with different levels of ability and different backgrounds that place varying degrees on educational success. It’s herculean to separate what the class is capable of vs. the influence of the teacher. Not only that, it’s counter-productive to children in order to do so. In the name of "accountability" teachers have been forced to "teach to the test" and have cut Art, Civics, and other subjects that are important in giving future citizens the depth of knowledge that they need to be well-rounded individuals. "Accountability" hurts the students.
 
My folks were upper-middling as educators – certainly not exemplary, but not terrible either. They enjoyed the job – though they frequently complained about their useless unions – but retired three years early recently due to the declining state of America’s children. Both have agreed that in the last decade, their classes had become less manageable, ruder, less interested in education, and more grueling to work with at both the elementary and high-school level. The unions have nothing to do with that, and "busting" them won’t make kids any more likely to succeed. It will simply expose teachers even further to the whims of unreasonable parents, fickle school boards, and poorly-implemented curriculum. Not get rid of the tiny minority of "dreadful" teachers that you seem to think are responsible for the decay of inner city schools.
 
One more:

Your demonization of teachers’ unions as a whole is off base. I live in the South, a decidedly non-unionized region, and my wife was a public school teacher. Yes, teachers’ unions are problematic. They make it very hard for new teachers to get jobs and make it too easy for terrible teachers to stay in their jobs. However, eliminating unions doesn’t really address the problem of accountability. The dirty little secret with public education in non-unionized areas is that terrible teachers stay in their jobs too, albeit with less pay and worse benefits. There are too few teachers available for all the schools with openings, so, although many administrations are quite capable of identifying bad teachers, they don’t have options for replacing them (ironically, their way of punishing them is often by removing them from advanced and honors classes, thus putting students who need the best instruction with the worst teachers). Yes, this may be even worse in unionized areas because they limit the available positions for new teachers who could possibly do a much better job, and yes, my wife has met teachers who came South because there were very few openings as a result of union agreements. 

However, the unions help make sure teachers do not get taken advantage of. Teachers in the South never get paid overtime, even though they lose their planning periods (these are not breaks; these are times when teachers are supposed to be able to grade papers, plan for their classes, or catch up on other administrative tasks), are routinely asked to stay after school past “contract hours” (usually 3:30 or 4pm in most schools) for meetings, or are often “heartily encouraged” (ie required) to attend a certain number of student events during the course of the year. Teachers often lose their lunches for at least one week out of the month to either supervise the children at lunch or meet with parents. None of these things are written in to the contract per se, but administrators get to make requests of teachers under an “other duties requested by the school” clause in their contracts. Thus, administrators in non-unionized areas suffer from a lack of accountability, resulting in burned-out teachers.

Teaching is a service occupation, and any teacher who is good at and takes pride in his or her job must work outside “contract hours.” It is impossible to grade papers, even during planning hours, for five to six classes worth of children and prepared for the next class and contact parents of troubled students and do lunch duty. Papers get taken home, and teachers are not officially compensated for that time. Unions often help to make sure they are taken advantage of just a little bit less.   

I completely agree with you that what is lacking in education is accountability, but simply suggesting that “busting” unions will fix that problem ignores that only comprehensive accountability, including students, parents, teachers, administrators, and superintendents, will really fix the problem.

“By The Balls”

Charles Bremner reports on an exchange between Sarkozy and Putin:

With Russian tanks only 30 miles from Tbilisi on August 12, Mr Sarkozy told Mr Putin that the world would not accept the overthrow of Georgia, Mr Levitte said.

"I am going to hang Saakashvili by the balls," Mr Putin replied.

Mr Sarkozy responded: "Hang him?"

"Why not? The Americans hanged Saddam Hussein," said Mr Putin.

Mr Sarkozy replied, using the familiar "tu": "Yes but do you want to end up like (President) Bush?"

Mr Putin was briefly lost for words, then said: "Ah, you have scored a point there."

(Hat tip: Massie)

Email Of The Day

A reader writes:

I just wanted to let you know that after Obama won, I took a look at how I consumed (and consumed, and consumed) my editorial over the last year or so, and realized that I read four Atlantic writers: yourself, Ta-Nehisi, Ambinder and Fallows every single day, and Goldberg and Douthat regularly.

I’d been a subscriber to The Atlantic for a long time, but fell off a couple of years ago for a variety of reasons. Today, after realizing just how much Atlantic Online I read, I felt it was my responsibility to subscribe and help keep it going. Of course, I’m looking forward to receiving the print product again, but it was the bloggers who convinced me to re-up.

Fantastic. The print magazine is on a roll right now. Subscribe here!

The Looming Bush War Crime Pardons

Mark Benjamin reports that Bush may issue a blanket pardon to protect his administration from war crimes. Benjamin also describes how Obama may approach Bush’s use of torture:

The Obama plan, first revealed by Salon in August, would emphasize fact-finding investigation over prosecution.

It is gaining currency in Washington as Obama advisors begin to coordinate with Democrats in Congress on the proposal. The plan would not rule out future prosecutions, but would delay a decision on that matter until all essential facts can be unearthed. Between the time necessary for the investigative process and the daunting array of policy problems Obama will face upon taking office, any decision on prosecutions probably would not come until a second Obama presidential term, should there be one.

But Digby doesn’t think it will happen:

A congressional commission would be great. But at the risk of sounding cynical, the odds of that happening are about as good as Sarah W. Palin becoming a Supreme Court justice. We’re now heavily into let bayhgones be bayhgones mode and I’d be shocked if this congress would do it.

The Other Albatross

Eric Posner lists facts that make closing Gitmo difficult while Paul Cassell points to a paper by Professor Amos Guiora on how to try the detainees:

I suggest a hybrid "domestic terror court" that would allow for an in camera review of confidential intelligence information presented by the prosecutor and a representative of the intelligence services. A properly constituted domestic terror court – comprised of judges schooled in understanding intelligence reports and intelligence gathering procedures, and aware of the necessity of preserving constitutional rights-is the proper starting point in moving forward with post 9/11 terrorist prosecutions. The proposed hybrid paradigm will ensure both the state’s obligations to keep intelligence and matters of national security confidential as well as the defendant’s right to a fair trial.