Tag Archives: silliness

It seems the local teachers union in Hartford, Connecticut, resents outside experts from the National Council on Teacher Quality looking at the effect their collective bargaining contract has on school performance and student learning. One issue in particular made me chuckle. From the Hartford Courant: [Hartford Federation of Teachers president Andrea] Johnson also disliked the recommendation that Hartford teachers be given fewer sick days. According to the report, many large districts and most business-sector jobs have an average of 10 sick days a year, while a Hartford teacher gets 20. On average, Hartford teachers use 11 of the 20 sick days each year, according to the report. If all the allotted sick and personal time (an additional five days) was taken, teachers would miss 14 percent of the school year, the report says. Johnson said that working with children every day requires more sick time because teachers are more susceptible to catching illnesses from the students and also passing along an illness to a room full of children. *Cough, cough.*

Every child is always a winner … Children just need better self-esteem … We only need to use positive incentives to help children learn more … Let’s reward the good but pretend like the bad doesn’t exist … I’m only 5 years old, and I get that this is marshmallow world nonsense. In fact, it’s the kind of silliness that makes many people question (sometimes fairly, sometimes not) the value of much of what goes on in public education. It gets even worse when the principle is applied not only to students, but also to teachers. At least if the union has its way. Witness the evidence from Chicago, a city with many failing schools: principal evaluations found only 3 out of every 1,000 teachers had unsatisfactory performance. While unions thrive on fears of bogeyman administrators who take out their vindictiveness on good teachers they don’t like, this evidence at least indicates the problem tips in the other direction. In any case, wouldn’t a more objective data system be better?

The horse isn’t dead yet, so I’m not going to stop beating it. I’ve already highlighted the silliness of the “magical money tree” solution to education coming from Congress. Let’s not mince words: the so-called “stimulus” bill in Washington, DC, is a disaster. A disaster for education reform, and a disaster for students – who would end up being burdened with far, far more debt than we can hope to gain from the proposed education spending. As much as I have enjoyed picking apart the nonsense of this gargantuan wasteful spending bill, the writers at the Edspresso blog truly have been in their heyday unraveling the topic. After a hot start a few years ago, Edspresso went through some tough, slow times. That appears to be in the past, though. The latest piece “Status Quo Education Stimulus” ironically lauds the National Education Association for showing us how “the stimulus bill is nothing more than additional funding for the education programs and structures that already exist, regardless of efficacy.”