At theaters all across America this weekend, a new comedy starring Cameron Diaz and Jason Segal hit the big screens. While a movie debuting on a Friday is nothing new, the content of this film stands out from the rest. The Bad Teacher title gives a subtle hint about the plot, and the movie's description reads, "Some teachers just don't give an F." It also describes Cameron Diaz's character, a teacher, as someone who "drinks" and who "gets high." Though comedies shouldn't necessarily be taken seriously, a television advertisement for the movie is what caught my attention.
The advertisement, which can be seen here, says that the United States used to have the number one educational system in the world, and we now rank 17th. The clip then proceeds to show Cameron Diaz's character throwing a dodge ball at a child before the Bad Teacher title line appears. The implication for the ad spot is clear: America's schooling has fallen because of bad teachers.
The timing of such an ill-advised commercial couldn't be worse for teachers, as educators across the United States are under attack from politicians and the media. New Jersey Governor Chris Christie has led a large portion of the fighting against teachers, claiming they make too much money, that they're not effective, and that they're too difficult to fire. He proposed a new way of judging teachers with his merit plan, a system that would judge the value of teachers based on student test data. His plan has received broad attention from media outlets, though the veracity of his boisterous arguments has either been ignored or hasn't been sought out.
Vanderbilt University, in one of the first scientific studies of such a merit educational system, tested the theory by offering math teachers in Nashville, Tennessee, between $5,000-$15,000 if their students scored higher on a state-based examination. The results? It didn't work, and the students didn't score higher even with hefty incentives for the teachers. As the report concluded, "The experiment was intended to test the notion that rewarding teachers for improved scores would cause scores to rise. By and large, results did not confirm this hypothesis."
Rather than report scientific evidence that appears to contradict popular notions like a merit system, the media has instead decided to focus on the failures of American schools. ABC's 20/20, for example, did a special report on Abraham Lincoln High School in New York City. One student told ABC that teachers were dull to the point of students actually sleeping in class. Another school administrator complained that the teachers unions were too strong and that their district was having a hard time firing a teacher who allegedly sent sexually explicit emails to a 16-year-old student. ABC even spoke with proclaimed education experts, such as Jay Greene, author of Education Myths, who claimed that the issue of money for schools is a misnomer. "If money were the solution, the problem would already be solved," Greene said, referencing the levels of increased government spending on schools the past 30 years.
The claims made in the special were serious enough that they should be looked into. If there was one area the 20/20 segment was lacking, it was telling the story of the teachers. What did they think of the accusations being made against their lot? I attempted to answer those questions by contacting a teacher I'll call "Alicia" who has taught in urban schools in central Florida as well as schools in Michigan. Her version of events painted a much different picture.
Alicia dismissed the notion of students sleeping in class due to boring teachers. While she admitted there are "boring" teachers out there, she feels most of that is the product of teachers having their lesson plans down to a science. To help streamline the process of teaching material, many teachers will save their lessons from the previous year and teach them again. If an educator has been on the job many years, they've likely done the material so many times that it may even appear dull to themselves. Alicia suggests the best way to beat such a rut is to have "hands-on" lessons and to mix things up from time-to-time. Also, Alicia astutely quipped, if you ask students how they feel about school, odds are they're going to say it's boring. You won't always learn about a subject that interests you, which is all a part of becoming a well-rounded member of society.
Alicia refuted the criticism of unions being too strong as a chicken or egg situation. Officials claim the unions are too strong, yet teachers need a strong union to protect them from organizations that wish to cut their funding, salaries and health care. The unions may protect some who aren't worthy of being educators but to use a potential pedophile and apply it to teachers generally is "not a fair situation for the good teachers," and is insulting.
Alicia seemed to take special offense to the claim money is a myth when it comes to education. She states:
I do believe money can be a big deciding factor in which schools get more money. I taught in an urban, inner-city school where we received much less funding per pupil than a school five minutes down the road in a wealthy area. These upper-class students had parents who were involved. Of course they are going to succeed better than my school, where the kids don't know where their next meal is coming from, except for school lunch. I believe the situation should be reversed. The schools that have a failing reputation due to low test scores need the money more than the schools who are producing high test scores and graduate rates.
Reading the criticisms of the American school system and speaking with Alicia has shown there are fundamental faults with the current system. What isn't fair, however, is to place all the blame on teachers, and a movie trailer implying educators are the reason our schools are falling apart is misinformed and in bad taste.
I wish to thank the teachers, such as Mrs. Carey, my first grade teacher, who wouldn't give up on me even when I had no desire to do my homework. I would like to thank the high school teachers who somehow managed to keep coming into school every day to teach a bunch of students who managed to unhinge the clock from our wall as a joke, or password protected our network computers so nobody could access them. I would like to thank the teachers who, when a quarter or dime hit the ground in the hallway and began to roll, would run in a full-blown sprint towards the change, shouting humorously that it would double their monthly salary. I would like to thank the teachers who pushed me to write even when I thought it was the most boring thing in the world -- you helped me earn my Master's degree and write for The Huffington Post.
To all my teachers: you changed my life, and this post is for you.
Scott Janssen is a recent graduate of Western Michigan University in Kalamazoo, Michigan, with a Master's degree in Political Science. He can be reached at dnaprovesnothing@gmail.com.
Marshall Fine: HuffPost Review: Bad Teacher
Bad Teacher (2011) - Movie Info - Yahoo! Movies
Bad Teacher - Movie Trailers - iTunes
Cameron Diaz & Justin Timberlake At 'Bad Teacher' Premiere (PHOTOS)
Try this on: by rewarding high-achieving teachers, you will attract more highly-qualified and highly-motivated people to the profession; retain the best performers, who might otherwise leave for more lucrative jobs; and "encourage" low performers to find other more suitable work.
Unfortunately, there is no one formula or model that can be used to separate the two. Simply using test scores won't work. Bad teachers who have high achievers in their classes will slip through, and good teachers in a class of low achievers won't get credit for their progress.
As the informed parent of a teenager in a public school system, I can tell you who the good ones and bad ones are at our school. (One particularly bad one just sat at his desk and handed out worksheets every single day, leaving the students to self-teach). But I understand that evaluations - whether by parents, students, teachers, or administrators - can also be political. Some parents don't care about learning as long as the right grade is "given," some students would prefer "easy" over "educational," and peer and administrative reviews can become tinged with "personal bias."
Ultimately, some combination of all of the above would probably work best, and is certainly a better way than the "pay everyone the same" system we have now.
The fact is no matter where you go, you're going to find mostly hard working, honest people who are simply trying to make a living, as well as a FEW who will be there just for the paycheck and nothing more. To make the rest of the good, honest workforce pay a price for those who don't care is not just unfair, it borders on absurd.
We could do it differently. For instance, all school tax dollars could be gathered up on a national basis and divided evenly per-person. If we did that, however, the cost of services in a particular area would not be accurately reflecting, giving the equally divided dollars very different real buying power between, say, Cheyenne and New York City.
Every alternative model of funding has comparable downsides as well as advantages; it's the nature of systemic design that tradeoffs exist and choices must be made.
Always good to get a thinking person on board.
In most other fields, people are paid based on performance. Teachers aren't, and our educational system is in a dismal downward spiral. Taking a single study and applying it throughout is questionable science. For example: did it follow students whose teachers were paid on a merit-based system THROUGHOUT their time in school (all 12+ years), or did they just use a single year as a barometer?
It is also telling that teachers quickly try to turn blame everywhere but towards themselves, when the fact is everyone - teachers, administrators, parents, politicians - are to blame. Teachers continuing to turn blame everywhere else has undermined their position. Instead of trying to turn blame, the teachers (especially the unions) should recognize that there is a problem and make it clear that they are willing to work with the other stakeholders to address the problem. All I see now from the unions is an adversarial posture.
Incidentally, a good way to take politicians out of the mix? Take the tact of some of the most liberal countries in the world and institute nation-wide school choice.
So certainly, the problem is bigger then just teachers, but teachers are a big part of the problem...to suggest otherwise (and to suggest that teachers are simply perpetual victims along with the students) is just the sort of victimology the Thinking Folk are getting sick of hearing.
Moreover, while a bad teacher will doubtless yield bad test scores more of the time, a good teacher may or may not yield good ones. Teachers will more likely produce good test scores when dealing with good students -- those who pay attention and do their work -- so teachers in a test score-centric model like what we call "merit pay" will opt to work in wealthier schools where they have a better chance of getting students whose efforts will make them look good (in most cases, as good as they ARE).
This isn't too far off from what we have today, but unless the pay offered to these exceptional teachers is substantial (as it is under the new D.C. contract), it's not worth the effort. Top people will prefer to enter other lines of work, including the much-more-lucrative private tutor field, and the school system will languish and ultimately collapse.
Concerning test scores, as I noted in another response, that is only one way to measure student performance. I never once advocated test scores in any of my comments.
Now this one I will comment on: "Top people will prefer to enter other lines of work, including the much-more-Âlucrative private tutor field, and the school system will languish and ultimately collapse."
If a particular school system is so poorly run that it must collapse then good riddance. No system should be "too big to fail" as our last two presidents were/are fond of saying. In order to fix our educational system we must be willing to let the bad elements - school systems, teachers, etc - fail and die so that improved elements can rise from the ashes.
In my mind, you should not get additional money for no additional accountability. What you are suggesting with your comments is creating mechanisms of accountability are impossible without more money. So we are at a crossroads I suppose...but then I go back to Einstein again as he defines insanity: "doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results."
Keeping schools the way they are or creating a few minimal bandaids is just doing the same thing and expecting different results.
just look into it, there's a reason why countries with better education marks than the US have higher paid teachers, higher funding, and more importantly the community support they need to suceed.