teachers Options

[brooklyneast05]

should we be able to fire teachers who have failing classes? who seem to suck at teaching? should we pay them less? should teachers with passing classes get paid more?

[fixtatik]

I really think it does have a lot to do with the quality of teachers. American educational practices have a tendency to lean teachers this way or that, but in general, teachers really do have a lot of control over how they teach.

A couple examples:

My AP biology teacher was horrific. Everything she "taught" us was irrelevant to the subject at hand. There was a time she spent the entire period trying to convince us that she saved a maternity ward filled with babies that all happened to have a very rare disease. The next time we met, she tried it again. After that, she claimed to have invented milk (no joke), and that she got a doctored fired from his job because he recommended her husband start eating organic foods instead of McDonald's. On top of her idiotic anecdotes, if any of us were having trouble with an assignment and asked for a little push in the right direction, she would shoo us off with a brush of her hand claiming, "It's not my job to tell you how to do it."

On the other hand, there were two math teachers (a father and son) who were excellent. They also told little stories while they taught, but they were short (under a minute long) and they related to the day's lesson. If someone needed help, they would drop everything until a student understood perfectly.

The rest were mid-line, decent teachers. They cared enough to help out, but no others were on the spectrum ends like the biology and math teachers.

Anyway, my point is that yes, I absolutely believe lousy teachers should be removed from their positions. My biology class taught each other outside of school so we wouldn't bomb the exam. She was the type of *insert repulsive word* who would complain about her toes hurting, then sit behind her desk picking at her fingernails for the rest of the period without giving us anything to do. She also stole my pen. It was a nice pen.