Wednesday, July 16, 2008

The Blahs

Blahhhhh. Much of today did not reach even that level of dissatisfaction. I am too tired to go to bed and too bummed to do much of anything else.
Faith, hope, love. . . all choices, huh? Must try, which reminds me of "must control fist of death." Anger is easier and so much more satisfying than blahhhh.
I did read a column in Newsweek today about making teachers accountable. I understand the theory, but like much of life, applying general standards and measurements nationally can not address the nuances of the advancement of the particular people involved in education. On the other hand, I think the SAT or something like it is necessary since students leave Wyoming to attend college in New Hampshire. It's the old apple and orange problem. Part of the trouble with measuring teacher success is the uncontrolled variable of the student. More about that another time. This is still rumbling around in my brain.

2 comments:

Burton Chapman said...

I haven't seen Newsweek article, but it would be nice if there were some way to hold teachers accountable and at the same time reward teachers for improvements in their students' test results. Most school systems' standard pay scale is based only on the type of college degree the teacher has and number of years taught. Currently there are not a lot of financial ways to reward a dynamic, hard-working, innovative teacher and not reward another teacher who does just enough to not get fired from one year to the next. If each teacher has the same degree and same number of years in the system they would get paid the same. I wish there were some sort of incentive pay in teacher contracts like there is in the business world where the more effectively one does his or her job the more money that employee would make.

Bridgett said...

ah!! There you are again!