What do you mean, what happened? We still have schools, public and private schools in every city and town in the United States, don’t we? Yes, but the quality and caliber, and excellence of education in the United States has declined. Why? Education was the cornerstone of the unique endowment we citizens were blessed with 60 years ago because we lived in the most phenomenal nation on the planet, but that extraordinary education does not exist anymore.
As an experienced, life-long teacher, who has taught many different grades, in two different states, these are four, in my opinion, of the top reasons why the quality of education has declined and continues to decline in the United States.
*The teacher’s unions and their emphasis on teachers, not education or students.
*Common Core
*Loss of respect over the years of the value of education.
*Different changes in education that have destroyed the quality of education.
Now-a-days, if you talk to an educator, he or she would probably tell you the loss of quality of education is money – low salaries for teachers. Ridiculous, I say! Teachers in the U.S.are in the classroom 180 days a year. White collar and blue collar workers work an average 245 days a year with a two-week vacation and five holidays. I calculated the number of days I had off — two and a half months for summer vacation, two weeks for Christmas, one week for spring vacation, two days for Thanksgiving, other days for president holidays, and many days for all the other holidays, and I figured I worked about eight months out of the year. I was well paid for eight months of work. If I worked all year with only two weeks off for vacation, I should have been paid more. Now teachers get time off to prepare grades. Teachers are well paid for the number of days they work during the year. The problem with declining quality schools is not the teacher’s salary.
Let me first tell you a little about myself and my experience in education which started in 1963. I have a bachelor’s in education, a master’s degree in Educational Administration, and I am now teaching high-functioning autistic children. Most of my years in education were in the public schools in California. For a short time I was principal at a high school and taught for six years at a community college in California. My teaching credential allowed me to teach all subjects, all grades from seventh to 14th grades.
My first position in California was teaching ninth grade English to migrant worker’s children in a Central California farming town, and I taught seventh – ninth grade students in a prominent Oakland junior high school. At this school I taught “Mentally Retarted” students, as they were called at the time, with IQs from 52 to 64. I also instructed eighth grade history classes and seventh grade food and sewing classes. In Pinole, California, I taught high school English, and then transferred to a brand new kind of high school in California called a “Necessary Small School.” Our building was on the same site as the high school but we served students who were “falling through the cracks” so to speak. Their attendance, scores and grades needed special attention. They only had to attend school three hours a day. Smart, huh? Students who were not doing well only attended school for three hours a day. The “educators” felt that three hours was all they could handle. From there I transferred to a Continuation High School in the district, wrote a grant that brought in thousands of dollars to the school, and spearheaded an educational program that earned the school the title of “California Continuation High School of the Year.” I was awarded “Teacher of the Year” in my district.
My teaching experience not only spans numerous years, but I taught a number of different kinds of learners, from “regular” students, to mentally challenged students, to migrant children with English language challenges, to troubled students who had severe learning problems or severe home difficulties that made going to school, regularly, almost impossible.
My first reason that the quality of education is declining is – the teacher’s unions. The unions run the schools, not the teachers. The unions are not run by educators. California schools were run by paid union administrators and received a higher income through money collected from the teachers, than the salaries paid to the teachers. The union negotiated the salaries and agreed that teachers not be paid additional monies for outstanding teaching practices. This policy eliminated any incentive for teachers to strive to work harder, or do more for students. Teachers do not receive bonuses. Teachers HAD to join the union when they were hired by the district, and union dues were automatically taken out of the salary. If a teacher did not want to be a part of the union, the dues amount was still subtracted from the earnings and sent into a different district fund.
To find out the real scoop about the union, I was a union representative and attended the meetings. I requested a copy of the monthly union budget and learned that a great percentage of our monthly dues ($175,000, $175 a month from 1000 teachers) went to the California State Teachers Union coffers and to the National Teachers Union for their purposes, not our local needs. Local union agendas were produced by the union administrators, not teachers. l also learned that the reports from the meetings were incorrectly presented to the teachers favoring the union.
Some more interesting information I learned about the district’s attempts to eliminate a bad teacher was that teachers in many states cannot be fired because of unions. Costs are extremely high for a district to try to fight a union to fire a teacher, so several districts provide a “special room” for those “fired” teachers to go to each day instead of to the classroom. They are paid a regular salary for sitting in the room during the school hours. The unions are NOT fighting for education or the children.
In Singapore, the highest performing country in the world for math scores, reading scores and other subjects, the students go to school for over 193 days. South Korea for 220 days a year. In the USA students attend school for 180 days, mentioned earlier, and have 10 – 11 weeks off a year. Singapore students have 6 weeks off a year. Of course these countries out shine American youth. I believe the unions are in favor of teachers having numerous days off. They wrestle for more money for teachers, but not for more days for students to attend school.
The second reason that the quality of education has declined is because of Common Core. Again, common core was not created to educate children, it is to serve the plans of a group of people who want to have more control of what is taught in the schools. For example, history is not history any more. Children do not learn about the struggles and sacrifices of our founding fathers, nor to be patriots or to be proud of their country. We are seeing some of the results of common core — lower math scores, lower reading scores, a false notion of what critical thinking is, no understanding about the Constitution. Critical thinking under common core is for students to learn to think the way they are taught, not to study all sides of an issue and be able to make an intelligent choice because they will know all the information.
The third reason the quality has declined is the loss of respect for education. When I wrote the grant for the continuation high school, I witnessed the beginnings of increased disrespect for education in the schools. Parents did not teach their children to respect education. Parents did not support the school. Students did not have to attend classes. BUT more importantly, somewhere along the line, so many more students over the years, did not respect teachers or the profession, as they did when I was growing up, nor when I began teaching years ago. 30% of students in the United States have poor attendance. I see teachers wear “Saturday” clothes and discipline suffers. Years ago, teachers dressed up as professionals. Students were held accountable for their actions, and discipline was critical.
And the last of the four reasons, in my opinion, are the changes that educators have made over the years. “Top,” younger educators think their new ideas are better than the “old” ways. For instance, school used to be seven hours a day, everyday. In recent years I substituted in some high schools where students were given time off during the middle of each day. The idea was to give time for students who were failing or receiving D’s to go to those classes and have time to do make-up work. Students receiving A’s, B’s and C’s could choose to see a movie, play video games, or just talk. I asked about this new type of schedule and was told, “Students can’t handle a full day of school. They need time to relax.” What will happen when their bosses tell them they are expected to work a full eight-hour day? What happened to the idea that students should complete make-up work at home? How much learning time was lost each week for all the other students? Think of it, 45 minutes a day times 5 days, times 180 days. What an enormous amount of time! What a tragedy!
There are more reasons, in my mind, and perhaps in your mind to explain the decline of quality in education. What a difference it would make to just fix these four. No one is talking about them as I wish they would. Can anything be done now, or is it too late?
