sk47
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- Nov 12, 2020
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- Jeff
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Hello; well stated. It is in some ways like the added dealer markup on popular car /truck models. If there is a demand for a model the dealers just add to the MSRP as long as someone keeps coming in and will pay.Public universities receive federal grant money directly, and accept students who pay with federal loans. They have no incentive to keep costs down, so long as the money keeps coming in.
Hello; I will tell one story, but it was typical of public school attitudes by the time I left the profession. The story is about how the measure of a students performance as an indicator of achievement was not important. Keeping parents happy was. I can add to the story about how the grading system I used was super easy for any student who tried at all. That the people in charge of a school system actually wanted students who were not gaining education or life skills to be rewarded with passing grades.Until there is loan reform and education reform, the cycle will continue. The education system is being run for profit, not for learning.
I was teaching in a high school. I had replaced a biology/science teacher. I had already worked out a pension in a different state which had a bearing on my attitude.
(Side note -There were some students who did the work. Who made the effort to get an education. This happened in the AP Biology classes for sure but also there were a few in the general classes.)
Back to the story. The first year at the new high school I taught the Science/Biology classes in which the students were tested by the state at term end. I had some problems with students but not too many. By the second year the school had hired a much younger teacher and put her in the those classes. I imagine planning for long term as I was already close to the end of a career.
I was given the general classes filled with students who would not be tested at term end. The classes were loaded up. Had discipline problems pretty much all the time, but such is another story. There was a very different attitude among those students and a different attitude from the school principal as well. Skip to the crux of the story. At the end of the first semester I was called in by the principal.
He had discovered I was giving a number of students failing grades. I was given a lecture about how the students and their parents were our clients and I needed to cater to them. I replied that I felt the citizens of the state/county were paying for the school and generally expected the students to be educated so as to become productive and educated members of society. I offered to allow my grading system to be examined to see if I was being unfair about the grades. Of course my points did not matter. He explained how as the school principal he had the authority to change the grades I had given and would do so.
Next term I gave out 17 failing grades, but after they were recorded went to the records office and picked up 17 change of grade forms. I signed the 17 forms but did not put down a grade. Took those 17 forms to the principal and left it to him to put a grade. So after I had spent a semester with the students, then someone who had not spent any time with them at all picked their grades.
One note. The fact I had already put in the time to have a pension had me in a position to be that bold. I was in fact let go by the school system at the end of the second year. A teacher who needs to keep a job will not be able to defy the system by holding students to a proper standard.
Another note. Sadly if the school systems could be reformed to some standard where a proper education was the more important goal it would take about 12 years or so to show full effect. The time it takes to send a student thru the 12 grades. There could be some limited earlier benefit of course as the students and parents caught on that complaining about grades would not "fix" a poor performance anymore.
That some countries have already gone this path may have something to do with why the USA needs to bring in engineers the way we do.
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