| Author | Message | ||
     Melidere |
Lisat, I can't figure out, when we are talking about setting the 'standards' for excellence, exactly what they would be. In a corporate case...the answer is really clear...profitability. If I chat with four parents about what they expect from the school system...i get four completely different answers. A lot of parents measure a school by how responsive school personnel are to THEM (and a lot of private schools put serious money behind making sure the PARENTS feel pampered). The way i see it...there's one group hounding for something measurable like test scores. I never understand how they get there. It completely misses the fact that there are some children who are never going to score perfectly on their SAT's no matter what kind of education you give them. Schools trying to perform to that model have several avenues, the easiest of which is to make sure that lower-performing kids are either gently (or not so gently) discouraged from joining or removed. Many private schools go to great lengths of interviewing and testing to make sure that any child who might bring down their averages never walk in the door. If you use a business model to manage schools, then your 'product' inevitably becomes the kids. As any parent knows...measuring your parenting skills by the 'product' you produce is invariably self-defeating. The other problem with trying to manage your teaching personnel using a business model is that there is no way in an education system to measure the value of their 'product' so there is no way to know what is a reasonable 'cost' for their services. What value do we put on a well-educated kid? When we know that, we'll know how much we could pay to accomplish that and still have a 'profit'. There are competing interests in school funding with widely divergent goals. To many, particularly those without children in the school system, there is NO value to the 'product' so they are determined to only pay the absolute minimum that the law allows. Others, seeing the 'product' as 'priceless' would pay dearly and sacrifice much for what they view as the future of our country. | ||
| Hobsonschoice |
A school board where no member received an endorsement from the SO-M Teachers Association AND never hearing the phrase, "It is not in the contract". | ||
| Spw784 |
Melidere or Ffof, you can call the dept heads or send them an email. All district staff have an email address. It's probably listed on the district website: http://www.somsd.k12.nj.us | ||
| Kathy |
Standard email addresses for district staff are first initial plus last name, up to a total of 8 letters. For instance, the Superintendent's address is phorosch@somsd.k12.nj.us. | ||
| Lisat |
Melidere, I enjoyed reading your thoughtful and thought provoking response. Obviously, this is a complicated matter. Here are some of my thoughts. You say 4 different people will tell you 4 different things that are most important for a school to deliver. I say count all 4 things. If one of those things is responsiveness by the school to the parents, count it as important. Measure it. I for one think it's terribly important. Who usually cares more for his or her child than the parent? No one. Someone or some institution that is treating my child well, and is challenging my child academically will get the very best out of me. So, if it benefits the school to consider the parent part of the team and be responsive, do so. Not being responsive is one reason a parent would pull a child out of the system and send him/her to private school. And if he/she would have scored high... then it would have been beneficial to the school to be more responsive to the parents. You note that the standard of business is profitability and so business concepts may not work in education. As I see it, business units are measured by profitability, but those individuals imbedded within the system are often not. How is the secretary or an art director within a corporation measured? At corporations, goals are set both by the individual and by the individual's boss. And the goals are often not about profits, they are about doing one's job competently. I think schools and teachers should be assessed on a variety of measures. Measurement has to be made by comparing students from their start to their finish. In other words improvement. As I've said before, I think there should be an academic plan for every child and goals. And parents should be aware of the plan and agree to it or not. Of course, there should be minimums set. For instance, there might be a goal that every child in the kindergarten class know 30 sight words by the end of the year. But if a child came in reading already, there should be different goals for that child. And the teacher should be measured by the goals set and achieved. (And the goals should be open so kids aren't assessed below their abilities at the beginning of the year to fake the end results.) There should be parent (and in the upper grades, student) evaluations of teachers, and the schools. There should be self-evaluations by teachers and students. Measure improvement in student attendance. Measure parent participation in activities. Like a college that tells its alumni, 'hey, you, class of '88, only 20% of you have donated money' make parent participation public (not the individuals, but the levels). If the PTA wants more people at the meeting, write about it in the newsletter or the newspaper or a flyer. Make it public. I also think that as private schools must gear up and show off during open houses to win over prospective parents (the customers), public schools should be expected to do a little song and dance too. When I see an art exhibit at a school, I'm getting a sense of what the art teacher is trying to do with the students. Public schools should be more public if they're to garner the goodwill and generosity of their customers and the larger community (the shareholders). How? Have couple of open houses and show off the work of the children. Poetry, writing, science projects, art, even in the earliest grades. Have every child represented and show off the children's work to the entire community. I went to an open house at Farbrook and was amazed at the children's writing. Yes, their test scores are exceptional, but their reputation has also been built by the the satifaction of the parents and by the children's work. Work that is bursting forth from the walls. It's from the work that I can see what the school is trying to accomplish. Have our public schools do exhibits in the library and in other public spaces so everyone can see what's being accomplished. Show off. Try to impress the shareholders. Taxpayers who don't have children will see what's being taught and learned with their money. They may care more. Make it public. Encourage teachers to go for local, regional and national awards. Then show it off. And for an individual student, we all know that his/her achievement in life will depend on a great deal more than a standardized test score. I remember the moment in 6th grade that we were each handed a card for fingerprinting and told not to look at the other side. I now know (and so do my classmates) the IQ's of almost every child in my class. (My best friend actually followed the instructions and didn't look.) For many, like the girl whose score was well below average, it was as though that number had been branded onto their foreheads. If children are made to feel that the numbers they achieve are all-important, then the children will feel that much less important. I think with the barriers and challenges that this community is facing, what the schools/parents/administration need to do is to engender a sense of teamwork and community yet demand individual accountability by teachers, students and parents. | ||
| Melidere |
Lots of us were not privy to those darned 'IQ' scores. I remember in college when they opened up our records and we could request a look at them and all my roommates applied and we all got our first look-see at those scores. One of my roommates, clearly the brightest of us all, looked at her score; 111. She was crushed. No wonder she had to work so hard...she was way behind the 8 ball. Why was she fighting so hard? It was hopeless. She wouldn't get dressed for weeks. Wouldn't go to class. Sat on the living room floor and played solitaire. We finally couldn't take it anymore and went to the dean and asked that he look into this matter, that something was clearly wrong. A call to her midwest high school revealed a mistake transcribing the numbers. She was near-genius. She got up. We learned a lot. I hate those scores. | ||
| Melidere |
As to the other stuff, My experience in our elementary school system was certainly almost exactly as you describe it should be. The teachers had frequent one-on-one meetings with us to discuss our child's progress. We received regular communications about things we could do to supplement/enhance our child's education, based on his/her individual needs. When we went to those conferences there were examples of their work all over the walls. The science fair drew all the parents over several days to see all of the kids projects. The art fair filled the halls and the gym. The reading teacher, recognizing our child's love of reading, brought in a new book for him/her out of her husband's library and her husband and my child exchanged thoughts on paper about each book. Yes, Far Brook's open houses are quite impressive. The amount of money they put into materials dwarfs the amount of money we can spend in the public schools. It was quite a while ago, but at one point they were bragging that they only accepted one in 300 applicants. I have a friend who attended a school quite similar to Far Brook. She said that she had only been there a few years when she realized that all that art work and all those plays she was doing were more akin to treating her like a trained seal than an investment in her education. She felt she was constantly diverted from LEARNING to make sure that she PERFORMED in such a way as to help the school give her parents visual and auditory proof that all that money wasn't for naught. She vehemently recommended against putting another child through that. I don't mean to pick on Far Brook; it's a beautiful school. But all schools are not for all children and they target and focus on a very specific need. | ||
| Lisat |
Melidere, Your experience of this school system sounds good. And I have friends here at other schools and at my child's school who have had good experiences, too. But I'd like to know more about your experience, if you don't mind sharing. If I remember correctly your children are older and you have 3. Was the quality of the teachers pretty even? They were all good? Did you mostly feel that they were assessing your children correctly, understanding their strengths and weaknesses? Did you ever request a teacher for your child? If so, how was this request treated? Were your friends in the same school having similarly good experiences? Do you see a difference in the school system now as compared to when your children attended? Thanks, Lisa | ||
| Melidere |
out of the first five teachers (for one) 2 were great, 2 were good, and one was 'ok'. I think that is an amazing batting average for any school. Yes, i've requested a specific teacher, once, and it was granted. Yes, the other parents i knew were having similar experiences. No, I don't see any difference. My children are young. I spend most of my time doing my job, with my children, at home. That entails me making sure they are well-rested, well-fed, get enough exercise, enjoy some of the experiences that the proximity to the city can give them, and are, in general, prepared for the job of learning when they get to school in the morning. If my children are disrespectful or inattentive, the teacher has my support in correcting that. Then i let the teachers do their job. I've been pleased with it, all in all. I have participated, most years, in giving the class a day of my time to teach them about what i do (to make money). I've always been well-received and welcomed in that program. My children have no particular learning problems or any particular needs that stress the system. I understand that i'm blessed. The public school system has the greatest difficulty dealing with children with special needs and i haven't had to battle that. My biggest complaint is with the extra-curricular activities, music and chorus, that kind of thing. It's squeezed in, time taken from precious lunch or recess time, and that makes it more difficult for a parent to convince a child who is only marginally interested to get the basics in those areas that i believe are necessary to the education of a well-rounded adult. | ||
| Deadwhitemale |
Experience is the best teacher. This district threw out the curricula which were used when it was in the top tier in the State, and the U.S.A., (which it was in the 70's). Does anyone have any idea if the departments keep archival copies of what was in place twenty years ago, thirty? Any readers attend our schools years ago? Remember anything on point? DWM | ||
| Lisat |
Thanks, Melidere. | ||
| Mtierney |
Today's Ledger has an article stating that Newark is going to India to entice math and science teachers there to come here. Now what does that say about our high schools and colleges? Are our schools not producing people capable of teaching these subjects? Is Newark a complete turnoff for prospective US teachers? Is it all about money? | ||
| Nakaille |
Mtierney: the entire country has a shortage of math and science teachers. The reason? We don't pay enough compared to jobs in business and industry. That's what it says about our high school and colleges. Few people train in this area and those that do are easily enticed to the corporate and research worlds even before they graduate. The folks who get certified are vulnerable to being recruited into industry when they get frustrated after a couple of years of low salaries. So then we have high turnover of inexperienced teachers. Not the best model for building a solid teaching force. It's just another thing to keep in mind as we talk about cutting the school budget. Bacata | ||
| Mtierney |
I got my answer: It is all about money. | ||
| Ashear |
Mtierney: Are you suggesting that it is wrong for teachers to expect to be paid what their skills are worth? I personally have chosen a public interest job that pays a lot less than I could earn in a corporate context, but that doesn't mean I don't think I should be paid more or that those who haven't made that choice are bad people. | ||
| Jur050 |
I'm allowed to dream aren't I? Teaching our children is of primary importance. Teacher's should have starting salaries of $100,000 per year. That way, the best and brightest would be rewarded for pursuing a career as educators of our most valuable asset, our children! Professions such as the Law, Medicine, and Investment Banking, have done this for years. They attract the quality students by offering big money. Money paid should be commensurate with the value of the job. Is there any more valuable? Once hired, our teachers should then be made to adhere to rigorous standards and performance tests. This would be mandatory in order to keep making the minimum, and receiving bonuses, based on performance. What's wrong with this dream? | ||
| Wendy |
JUR050, I agree completely. I don't know how the pay stucture/budget of the rest of the school district would have to be changed to afford this. Maybe this is where the income tax for education thoughts would come in. | ||
| Nilmiester |
I agree too. Let's take some of the HUGE administration salaries and divert them to our teachers. Horshack won't like it but too bad, Mr. Kotter will!!! | ||
| Jem |
Wait a minute, wait a minute! Are you guys NUTS?? I know plenty of kids right out of college who would be happy to have a starting salary of $40,000, which is a good bit more than the current starting salary in this district. Talk about giving away the store!!! Where would you suggest we go from a $100,000 starting salary? What are you proposing we pay veteran teachers? $200,000? $250,000? Sure, why not!!! How many teachers exactly could anyone afford at those rates? I can hardly believe this is the same bunch who complains about government profligacy! Absolutely, we should pay more than just a living wage to our teachers, and teachers should be paid salaries and receive raises commensurate with the value of what they do, but, let's be real, here, guys! | ||
| Mim |
I love teachers! But when you plan these fab salaries for them, please remember that they work shorter days than we corporate types (yeah, I know, they're supposed to be planning lessons and marking papers) and are also off MUCH more. I am constantly lining up 'vacation care' for my child, for vacations I certainly do not get. Not to mention the summer... |
