GM hourly workers get $4,000 bonuses

[wrveres]

Between K-12, I literally had only one bad teacher,

* most bank executives deserve to be thrown in jail for life and have every dollar they own taken away from them and put into social programs

.

* what news agency reports when any corporate executive gets a pay raise at the expense of his employees and the consumers? Nothing. No one

um yeah, i am going to go ahead and disagree with that "one bad teacher" thing ...

[bigh0rt]

I am a scary dude. Fear the Colorado Cockle!

The really scary part is that you apparently don't mind taxpayer money going to the banks that killed our economy, but when it gets to teachers? HELL NAW! And yeah, unions do protect crappy teachers on occasion, but most teachers are good at their job. Between K-12, I literally had only one bad teacher, and he was more of a douchebag/hard grader/preferential-treatment-giver than a teacher who didn't convey the proper information. Granted, I grew up in the suburbs of Chicago so there's some experimental bias there, but 29.5 good teachers out of 30 total has to mean something, at least. And if we want to benefit these 29.5 teachers, we have to accept that there will always be some subpar teachers counting down to tenure. But guess what? There's always going to be some jerk out there to exploit whatever system is in effect at the moment. Like I've always said, I'd rather give food to a child that's already eaten than let a child go to bed hungry.

Somewhat off-topic, but was having this conversation with my parents when they invited me for dinner Friday night. My dad's a retired teacher and my mom's a bit out of touch with reality; one of those people who hears something and just starts howling about it as if it were gospel. Needless to say, we have interesting exchanges. At any rate, my mom is angry at the thought that her beloved son, who she believes to be an excellent teacher, may lose his job come June, so she was ranting and raving about crappy teachers having tenure, etc. And I brought up what I call the 10% Rule. Basically that regardless of profession, or any other factors really, approximately 10% of people are either crappy at their jobs and/or generally douches. People come to expect this from most walks of life. However, they don't seem to think it's acceptable in certain fields: police, firefighters, doctors, teachers, etc. It applies everywhere. And just like there are people like this in every profession and walk of life who make full careers out of it, thus is so in the aforementioned as well. But I digress.

I can't speak on behalf of the country, but in three different regions of New York State I've come across as many bad teachers as I can count on one hand; this includes substituting at three different school districts in the Albany area from K - 12, eight different schools in total, as well as in the Hudson Valley and Westchester. The vast majority of the people I've interacted with do a good to great job in their profession and are doing it because they love it. Sure, there are days where administration or the kids or some other nonsense grind on them, but that's with all jobs. And I'm sure that in other areas this isn't the case (in fact, I have an uncle who was a teacher in Yonkers who is the prototypical pain in the ass who these exaggerated political cartoons and flow charts are really referring to, who abused the system, and is the reason so much scrutiny is thrown at the system and the unions). The problem comes when people see these and assume that it is the norm instead of the few and far between extreme cases, like my stupid uncle, spoiling the bunch for the rest of us.

[Art Vandelay]

If you think that only 10 percent of people are either crappy at their jobs or douche bags, you're crazy.

[Madison]

um yeah, i am going to go ahead and disagree with that "one bad teacher" thing ...

Agreed. I can't count how many bad teachers my kid has had and I know I had at least a dozen that really had no place being paid for what they were doing.

[Neato Torpedo]

um yeah, i am going to go ahead and disagree with that "one bad teacher" thing ...

Agreed. I can't count how many bad teachers my kid has had and I know I had at least a dozen that really had no place being paid for what they were doing.

What were they doing wrong? Because it's interesting that you and wrveres agree that I had more than one bad teacher, especially since I'm only a few years removed from the public school system which gives me a more accurate representation of past experiences, compounded with that fact that neither of you have a damn clue as to who my teachers were or their quality of teaching. The sheer gall both of you have basing your opinions on literally zero information is amazing, and if you can't back your statement up with any kind of evidence that any of my teachers were bad, you have no choice than to shut whatever orifice you use to spout the nonsense that you do. And I figure that you can't possible give two completely baseless assessments in one day, so I'd really like to hear what your kid's teachers are doing wrong, so I can maybe compare them to my teachers just to see if we have different standards.

[urbanbreez]

um yeah, i am going to go ahead and disagree with that "one bad teacher" thing ...

Agreed. I can't count how many bad teachers my kid has had and I know I had at least a dozen that really had no place being paid for what they were doing.

What were they doing wrong? Because it's interesting that you and wrveres agree that I had more than one bad teacher, especially since I'm only a few years removed from the public school system which gives me a more accurate representation of past experiences, compounded with that fact that neither of you have a damn clue as to who my teachers were or their quality of teaching. The sheer gall both of you have basing your opinions on literally zero information is amazing, and if you can't back your statement up with any kind of evidence that any of my teachers were bad, you have no choice than to shut whatever orifice you use to spout the nonsense that you do. And I figure that you can't possible give two completely baseless assessments in one day, so I'd really like to hear what your kid's teachers are doing wrong, so I can maybe compare them to my teachers just to see if we have different standards.

you are now aware that you be postin in a troll thread yo.

[Madison]

um yeah, i am going to go ahead and disagree with that "one bad teacher" thing ...

Agreed. I can't count how many bad teachers my kid has had and I know I had at least a dozen that really had no place being paid for what they were doing.

What were they doing wrong? Because it's interesting that you and wrveres agree that I had more than one bad teacher, especially since I'm only a few years removed from the public school system which gives me a more accurate representation of past experiences, compounded with that fact that neither of you have a damn clue as to who my teachers were or their quality of teaching. The sheer gall both of you have basing your opinions on literally zero information is amazing, and if you can't back your statement up with any kind of evidence that any of my teachers were bad, you have no choice than to shut whatever orifice you use to spout the nonsense that you do. And I figure that you can't possible give two completely baseless assessments in one day, so I'd really like to hear what your kid's teachers are doing wrong, so I can maybe compare them to my teachers just to see if we have different standards.

Obviously you had more than one bad teacher if you read those comments as saying you were wrong and that you had more than one bad teacher. I was simply agreeing with WR that there are way more bad teachers out there than you think.

And my kid is currently in school, so your "more accurate representation of past experiences" drivel holds zero water since it's your past and my present.

As to spouting nonsense, you might want to look in the mirror for the culprit:

most teachers are good at their job

Based on your 30 teacher experience? Heck, my kid isn't even in high school yet and he's had more than 30 teachers already. He's had 12 this year alone (7 for regular school, 5 more at the alternative school - bad behavior). At least half don't deserve their paychecks and the majority of them can't do something as simple as update his grades. It's all online, we check daily, and he gets punished for bad grades/missing assignments/etc, but that's really hard to do accurately when most of his teachers cannot be bothered enough to do their jobs.

29.5 good teachers out of 30 total has to mean something,

Yeah, means you must have been really lucky or miscounted (hope you were lucky, miscounting by that much would be the result of bad teaching). I had in the neighborhood of 25 teachers in high school alone! You only had 30 in your life? And only 1 was bad, which you discounted to one half? Cool for you but that isn't the norm.

I've always said, I'd rather give food to a child that's already eaten

Results in fat little piglets.

[Dan Lambskin]

Agreed. I can't count how many bad teachers my kid has had and I know I had at least a dozen that really had no place being paid for what they were doing.

What were they doing wrong? Because it's interesting that you and wrveres agree that I had more than one bad teacher, especially since I'm only a few years removed from the public school system which gives me a more accurate representation of past experiences, compounded with that fact that neither of you have a damn clue as to who my teachers were or their quality of teaching. The sheer gall both of you have basing your opinions on literally zero information is amazing, and if you can't back your statement up with any kind of evidence that any of my teachers were bad, you have no choice than to shut whatever orifice you use to spout the nonsense that you do. And I figure that you can't possible give two completely baseless assessments in one day, so I'd really like to hear what your kid's teachers are doing wrong, so I can maybe compare them to my teachers just to see if we have different standards.

Obviously you had more than one bad teacher if you read those comments as saying you were wrong and that you had more than one bad teacher. I was simply agreeing with WR that there are way more bad teachers out there than you think.

And my kid is currently in school, so your "more accurate representation of past experiences" drivel holds zero water since it's your past and my present.

As to spouting nonsense, you might want to look in the mirror for the culprit:

most teachers are good at their job

Based on your 30 teacher experience? Heck, my kid isn't even in high school yet and he's had more than 30 teachers already. He's had 12 this year alone (7 for regular school, 5 more at the alternative school - bad behavior). At least half don't deserve their paychecks and the majority of them can't do something as simple as update his grades. It's all online, we check daily, and he gets punished for bad grades/missing assignments/etc, but that's really hard to do accurately when most of his teachers cannot be bothered enough to do their jobs.

29.5 good teachers out of 30 total has to mean something,

Yeah, means you must have been really lucky or miscounted (hope you were lucky, miscounting by that much would be the result of bad teaching). I had in the neighborhood of 25 teachers in high school alone! You only had 30 in your life? And only 1 was bad, which you discounted to one half? Cool for you but that isn't the norm.

I've always said, I'd rather give food to a child that's already eaten

Results in fat little piglets.

how'd i get brought into this

[The Artful Dodger]

Heck, my kid isn't even in high school yet and he's had more than 30 teachers already. He's had 12 this year alone (7 for regular school, 5 more at the alternative school - bad behavior). At least half don't deserve their paychecks and the majority of them can't do something as simple as update his grades.

Maybe it's your district or particular school?

Anyhow, while I agree that the quality of public education nationwide has eroded some, the quality of individual teachers is hit-or-miss. Having attended both private and public schools, I think the same goes for private schools. Private school teachers are generally more competent because there's a tighter review process, but some have average standards at best, albeit certain factors are outside their own control (i.e. budget). Depends on the school, of course). On the flip side, the LAUSD was the second worst district in the country (at least when I was going to school), but I just happened to attend a school where there were less incompetent teachers, more average ones, and a few who were really outstanding. Some schools/districts simply have it worse.

The big problem with education in the States is there's a greater inequality between not just private and public schools, but there's also quite a gap of quality within private schools and within the public schools as well.

[Art Vandelay]

Without some sort of consensus--or at least a starting point--of what constitutes a "bad" teacher, this discussion is entirely pointless.