I hate to tell everyone hoping to see this professionally produced and performed version that you really missed the pinnacle of Anastasia retellings, which took place in a friend’s basement when we were all in elementary school. We memorized the entire movie and performed it verbatim. 5 girls. 1 onstage meltdown.…

and you will have a constant churn of people tryig to get out of those schools. read up on the research and you will see that rapid teacher turnover is horrible for all students and especially horrible for students of color, poor students, and students with disabilities.

Here’s what “tenure” does for teachers:

“Welch is also an investment partner with NewSchools Venture Fund, which connects entrepreneurs to public education projects financed through the philanthropy firm. These include several charter schools, charter management organizations and a handful of projects to increase teacher evaluation through instantaneous…

American schools can teach Singaporean and South Korean students as well as Singaporean and South Korean schools. American school can teach white American “comparably to the best European nations.” The US schools and tenure systems are fine as it is in term of providing education. What they can not do, is to be a tool…

ETA: One real world equivalent is a handicap in golf. *Surely* impoverished students in nightmare schools with limited safety, no computers, multimedia, books etc. deserve the same considerations of “fair competition” as the 1%ers who play golf?

To pretend that even the best teacher on planet earth could bridge that…

“Standardized testing being the core of our education”

It’s also why most can’t write for shit anymore. Writing tests can never be standardized, they simply *do not have the resources* to grade such. In online education classes at the collegiate level many times, due to bureaucratic controls, the content is entirely…

Elementary school teacher here. Think back to your time in education. You remember a few bad teachers you had as a kid? A couple? Yep. Now think of the many OTHERS who DON’T stand out. Who didn’t suck. Yes, tenure, unfortunately, sometimes makes it difficult to fire teachers who maybe aren’t great. Take any…

I can speak for NYS, but many of the “easier” schools are in wealthier areas. They pay a shit ton in taxes, and they can afford to pay their teachers more. You do less work for a substantial difference. If I taught in a different area of NY where I’m from instead of NYC, I would be making $20,000 more.

Yep. There’s another problem, too, here. Most of my students speak Russian at home. While they’re no longer technically classified as ELLs (English Language Learners now, not English as a Second Language because sometimes it’s not their second, and they just changed it to ENL, damn the acroynms!), they pretty much…

I’ve never known a single iteration of tenure that protects physical violence. That’s not a problem with unions or tenure, that’s a problem with a particular school or a particular union local.

25% of funding comes from property taxes. And if your school is falling apart, you better hope the community has deep pockets and will pass a bond measure. Most wealthy districts have nonprofit education foundations to supplement enrichment programs. Every art, music and PE teacher’s salary in my district is funded by…

Dude. The largest district in my county (Sonoma) tops out at $89k per year and that is after 25 years, a BA/BS, an MA AND an additional 75 units of continuing education (and if we want units to count, we have to pay for them. It cannot be district funded professional development. I easily spend $1000+ a year on…

My mom was a teacher for a long time in an affluent school district. Once one of these kids who’s never heard the word “no” accused her of hitting him because she wouldn’t tolerate his bullshit. The union stood behind her until supported her she was proven innocent. Without the teacher’s union that little rich brat…

“Those tests clearly need to be fixed. That is a valid issue.”

It has become the *only issue*. Ask any teacher, their ONLY directive now is the test. Tests have taken over and have *ALL the power now*, which is precisely WHY the tests that need to be fixed won’t ever be as the system now stands. They put a facade of a…

It is in California. Most of those teachers are in the Bay Area, Los Angeles, or San Diego. You are literally living in a low-rent area on that salary.

I live in the NYC metro area. I have my Masters plus 30 (30 graduate credits beyond my teaching certification). A Masters degree is mandatory in order to gain professional teaching certification in New York State. 45-60k in an area like this with our cost of living is NOT a reasonable wage. My school does not even…

“So yes standardized testing has a place in education, but it should not be the basis of education”

Exactly. Obviously education needs a rubric. Yet when it’s ONLY ABOUT THE RUBRIC - it’s not *applicable* to anything else and thus has no real value outside of itself.

That is the current status of public education, (yet…

Totally false. The only way a student is actually “evaluated” in their educational process is in their grades. Grades that show either progress or a regress, not some test they memorized prior. This entire system is ridiculous.