Blog Post #14

Teaching can be a Profession by Joel Klein- This is an article that was written by Joel Klein who was in charge of running New York's public school system for eight years. In his article he points out several issues with future educators and what his solutions are.

Mr. Klein's first issue is the training that those in the education field receive. He states in his article that "23 cannot boast a single (teacher education) program that provides solid math preparation resembling the practices of high-performing nations." He feels that those in the education program need to be better educated themselves before they are allowed to educate.

I agree with Mr. Klein's point that we students in the education field are not getting all the proper training we need to become the best of teachers. I do feel that it is far better than it was say even five years ago. With there being more diverse education courses, and course such as this one that help integrate technology into teaching. But there are often times in a few of my course that I feel that we as a class and even students are going through the motions. If we continue this then we can never become the educators we need to be.

His second argument is how teachers are chosen or hired. He feels that they hire anyone with an education degree. His article suggest that schools hire teachers from those who are in the top one third of their graduating class.

I'm sort of at a half and half with this argument. While I do believe that teachers need to be hired more carefully. I don't believe that they should strictly be chosen just from being in the top one third of their class. I say this because I don't feel that great teachers are great solely based on their class rank or their knowledge. While I feel a teacher must be very well educated in order to teach, I also feel that teachers need to be great with people too. Just because someone has a higher GPA or class rank doesn't mean that they can commutate or even inspire others. Teachers in the elementary to high school level see their students five days a week. Sure one can just smash knowledge in their heads but that doesn't mean that they will genuinely educate their students.

His final argument is on how teachers are rewarded. He says it is based on seniority but should be based on performance.

I completely agree with this. Having had both "experienced" but poor teachers and young but great teachers I honestly couldn't agree with this more. It is very sad to hear that teachers receive more pay more benefits etc. just because they have they have been their a certain number of years. While a teacher who has only been their a few years and has excellent student success is not awarded the
same.
Overall I thought that Klein brought up and made many great issues as well as solutions. We cannot fix the problems that we have with student education without fixing the problems that we have with those who are teaching first. These problems must be addressed as soon as possible.