$250,000 a year isn't rich!

[Torie]

The reason they cannot read Torie, is because of the privilege of the rich.

The rich have some plot to saddle the kids with union protected un-cannable incompetent teachers who got a C average in third rate former teaching colleges and worse?

I was actually thinking that educational level was closely tied to socioeconomic status of the community, that kids who are poor and have poorly educated parents are far more likely to be low-performing in public schools than kids from stable, middle-or-upper class families in more affluent neighborhoods , and that solving this problem would result in a more equitable distribution of wealth, which the rich don't want, obviously....

But your theory sounds much more plausible.

Sure poor kids start off with a handicap, which is why they need the best and most charismatic teachers, hired and fired on merit, who make very high salaries. My cousin runs Sesame Street. She tells me that at age 5, the vocabulary of an upper middle class kid is about 10 times as large (or something like that) as some poor kid whose parents are not educated. So you can see the problem right off the bat. Heck I was reading by the time I showed up to school (no I did not read and understand words like "purloin" and the like at 5, but I was on my way ). 

[Link]

The reason they cannot read Torie, is because of the privilege of the rich.

The rich have some plot to saddle the kids with union protected un-cannable incompetent teachers who got a C average in third rate former teaching colleges and worse?

I was actually thinking that educational level was closely tied to socioeconomic status of the community, that kids who are poor and have poorly educated parents are far more likely to be low-performing in public schools than kids from stable, middle-or-upper class families in more affluent neighborhoods , and that solving this problem would result in a more equitable distribution of wealth, which the rich don't want, obviously....

But your theory sounds much more plausible.

Sure poor kids start off with a handicap, which is why they need the best and most charismatic teachers, hired and fired on merit, who make very high salaries. My cousin runs Sesame Street. She tells me that at age 5, the vocabulary of an upper middle class kid is about 10 times as large (or something like that) as some poor kid whose parents are not educated. So you can see the problem right off the bat. Heck I was reading by the time I showed up to school (no I did not read and understand words like "purloin" and the like at 5, but I was on my way ). 

The education system itself cannont fix these children.  We can spend all the money in the world and a lot of them will not improve sufficiently.  You need a comprehensive program.  They need food, healthcare, housing, and transportation.  They need to be in a better environment.  Frankly they need better parents.  If a kind comes home to a terrible environment filled with ignorance and deprivation they are not going to do very well in school.  I would actually shift money from all the fancy schools and spend more on healthcare and counseling for students and parents.

[Torie]

Ya, ya, ya, but what you really need are very good and talented teachers. There is a huge data base supporting what I am saying. The rest is noise - including class size. Yes, it would be nice if we could transform these lower class families or broken families, and make them whole with middle class values, but we have been trying for decades, and throwing trillions of dollars at it, and mostly what we have managed to do, is make successful working class families move up a notch or two, and so on. But lifting the bottom is tough. This one fix is the laser beam approach that will get you by far the most bang for the buck. Trust me. This issue was a major hobby of mine for about a decade, and I read almost everything there was to read on the topic, and gave speeches on it.

There is an art to excellent teaching by the way (beyond knowing the material, which is of course a given, and all too often absent). I can elaborate on that a bit if you would like. I would make a very good teacher these days btw. Yes I would. 

[Skill and Chance]

You do realize that people making >$250,000 are <5% of the population and maybe 10-15% of the voters, right?  They could 90% block vote for the Republicans, and the Democrats could still with the general election handily.  Of all the groups to be afraid of, why this one?  If it's about campaign funding, just run a left wing billionaire who can self-fund his/her own campaign.

[All Along The Watchtower]

Ya, ya, ya, but what you really need are very good and talented teachers. There is a huge data base supporting what I am saying. The rest is noise - including class size. Yes, it would be nice if we could transform these lower class families or broken families, and make them whole with middle class values, but we have been trying for decades, and throwing trillions of dollars at it, and mostly what we have managed to do, is make successful working class families move up a notch or two, and so on. But lifting the bottom is tough. This one fix is the laser beam approach that will get you by far the most bang for the buck. Trust me. This issue was a major hobby of mine for about a decade, and I read almost everything there was to read on the topic, and gave speeches on it.

There is an art to excellent teaching by the way (beyond knowing the material, which is of course a given, and all too often absent). I can elaborate on that a bit if you would like. I would make a very good teacher these days btw. Yes I would. 

What kind of "Database" would this be? People who have created foundations and careers for themselves based on the idea that public education is inherently evil, that "the market" can "fix" the schools, and that making schools more "competitive" is the best way to educate chidlren?

The rest is not "noise." Class size is a crucial concern, as is the general problem of school districts in general always having to do more with less when budget cuts come because those geniuses in the private sector got a bit too drunk on speculation and crashed the economy yet again.

But the heart of the problem is that school districts are a reflection of the communities they come from. Change the communities, and you will change the school districts.

[opebo]

...Yes, it would be nice if we could transform these lower class families or broken families, and make them whole with middle class values, but we have been trying for decades, and throwing trillions of dollars at it,

Actually no, we have not tried to change anything Torie.  If we had tried to change anything you would not have millions.  It is capitalism itself which consumes the human chattel, and any programs which were tried briefly in the 1960s were just window dressing.

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Oxymoron.

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Alright, soo pay these teachers $250,000/year.

[Torie]

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Well you actually got rather close to the truth on something here opebo. Well done!  

[opebo]

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Well you actually got rather close to the truth on something here opebo. Well done!  

Most such fantasy-land plans which imagine a teacher can 'make a difference' expect the poor sod to spend his supposed 'three months off' studying for various 'advanced skills' and additional degrees in order to attain the trumped up 'master teacher' status.  I can tell you from experience - all these kind of performance-requirements do is force people to cease their actual work of teaching and prioritize nothing but meeting the requirements.  It ruins service.

The solution of course is socialism for society as a whole, and sinecures for teachers.

[Lief 🗽]

CBO says a millionaire's tax would more than pay for the Obama jobs bill:

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http://www.politico.com/blogs/glennthrush/1011/CBO_Millionaires_tax_raises_4527_Billion.html?wpisrc=nl_wonk

[Torie]

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Well you actually got rather close to the truth on something here opebo. Well done!  

Most such fantasy-land plans which imagine a teacher can 'make a difference' expect the poor sod to spend his supposed 'three months off' studying for various 'advanced skills' and additional degrees in order to attain the trumped up 'master teacher' status.  I can tell you from experience - all these kind of performance-requirements do is force people to cease their actual work of teaching and prioritize nothing but meeting the requirements.  It ruins service.

The solution of course is socialism for society as a whole, and sinecures for teachers.

No, obebo, you just don't get it do you?  You hire teachers like Torie dumb dumb.  Geez!

Do I have to list for you why I would be a great teacher?

[Torie]

CBO says a millionaire's tax would more than pay for the Obama jobs bill:

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http://www.politico.com/blogs/glennthrush/1011/CBO_Millionaires_tax_raises_4527_Billion.html?wpisrc=nl_wonk

Rather surprising actually. I smell a rat somewhere.

[Lief 🗽]

I do agree with you though, Torie, that raising taxes on only millionaire's is not a sustainable fiscal strategy. What we really need to do is repeal the entirety of the Bush tax cuts, and return all the tax rates to what they were during the Clinton era. Also capital gains need to be taxed at the same rate as regular income.

[opebo]

No, obebo, you just don't get it do you?  You hire teachers like Torie dumb dumb.  Geez!

Do I have to list for you why I would be a great teacher?

It is true I cannot imagine how you would be such, but if our criteria for procuring educators is this: like Torie, then I think we may as well give up the ghost now.  

[opebo]

I do agree with you though, Torie, that raising taxes on only millionaire's is not a sustainable fiscal strategy. What we really need to do is repeal the entirety of the Bush tax cuts, and return all the tax rates to what they were during the Clinton era. Also capital gains need to be taxed at the same rate as regular income.

Keep in mind that the Obama proposal raised taxes upon the parasitic class far too little - if rates were returned to the 70%+ range, with proper enforcement, revenues would be excellent.

[Torie]

No, obebo, you just don't get it do you?  You hire teachers like Torie dumb dumb.  Geez!

Do I have to list for you why I would be a great teacher?

It is true I cannot imagine how you would be such, but if our criteria for procuring educators is this: like Torie, then I think we may as well give up the ghost now.  

You don't think I would be a good teacher?  I'm hurt! 

[opebo]

You don't think I would be a good teacher?  I'm hurt! 

Actually I don't know you well enough to know, but I know you are rich, so I doubt you would put up with it.  It is terribly unpleasant.

[Torie]

You don't think I would be a good teacher?  I'm hurt! 

Actually I don't know you well enough to know, but I know you are rich, so I doubt you would put up with it.  It is terribly unpleasant.

Yes, I guess you don't. I don't operate that way by the way. But I digress.

[opebo]

Yes, I guess you don't. I don't operate that way by the way. But I digress.

What way?  You mean you don't react to unpleasantness?

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Of course one way of making sure that there is absolutely no chance of the best possible teachers joining the profession is to denigrate the profession, its practices and institutions (such as they are). As has been done in many countries for the bulk of the past thirty years, often in the guise of... er... attempting to raise educational standards. Bit of a paradox there.

[opebo]

Of course one way of making sure that there is absolutely no chance of the best possible teachers joining the profession is to denigrate the profession, its practices and institutions (such as they are). As has been done in many countries for the bulk of the past thirty years, often in the guise of... er... attempting to raise educational standards. Bit of a paradox there.

Precisely.  As I pointed out, in the past being a teacher was a sinecure.  Sans sinecure, the profession has little attraction.

[Link]

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Well you actually got rather close to the truth on something here opebo. Well done!  

The solution of course is socialism for society as a whole, and sinecures for teachers.

I agree with you about the need for socialism.  I don't agree with you about a confiscatory 75% tax rate.  Socialism and capitalism can coexist side by side.

Pouring money into schools is not a viable strategy.  Children do not only exist in a school.  Their entire environment needs to change.  They need to live in safe clean neighborhoods with access to adequate housing, transportation, healthcare, and nutrition.  The only way to ensure this is with a more aggressive socialist policy.  Teachers alone can't fix every child.  If the home environment sucks you will be wasting your money paying teachers $100,000 a year.

[Хahar 🤔]

Oh, and the $700,000 home someone mentioned.... where I'm from that's insane. For 700 grand it had better be a huge lakefront mansion next door to Cedar Point. Anyone who'd ever consider buying a $700k house is rich and knows it. My parents' house is worth about $120k. They probably paid less than half that amount for it 25 years ago when they bought it off my grandparents. Yup, my Dad grew up in the same house I did. Of course then it was surrounded by corn fields and now it's in a neighborhood, a nice neighborhood at that.

Where I live, a 2,280-square foot house will set you back $1.1 million. It's a bit much.

[Torie]

Of course one way of making sure that there is absolutely no chance of the best possible teachers joining the profession is to denigrate the profession, its practices and institutions (such as they are). As has been done in many countries for the bulk of the past thirty years, often in the guise of... er... attempting to raise educational standards. Bit of a paradox there.

If far too many teachers suck, one might as well own up to it. Sparing their feelings won't help the kids. The only thing one can ask is to be factual. That is the only way to begin to mitigate, and maybe someday move a fair amount closer to solving, the problem. We should find out what the Finnish are doing too.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

It's not a question of the 'feelings' of anyone currently in the profession (although I do tend to think that you don't get the best work out of people if you try to undermine and demoralise them, but that's by the by), but an expression of a fairly obvious reality; how do you expect to recruit the best people (however defined) to an occupation if the position of that occupation (both in material terms and in terms of authority) is under constant assault? Or if you impose a byzantine (and ever-changing) set of regulations, tests and 'market' mechanisms onto the profession that is supposed to be all about 'raising standards' but mostly seems to be about undermining the autonomy of teachers?

[Link]

It's not a question of the 'feelings' of anyone currently in the profession (although I do tend to think that you don't get the best work out of people if you try to undermine and demoralise them, but that's by the by), but an expression of a fairly obvious reality; how do you expect to recruit the best people (however defined) to an occupation if the position of that occupation (both in material terms and in terms of authority) is under constant assault? Or if you impose a byzantine (and ever-changing) set of regulations, tests and 'market' mechanisms onto the profession that is supposed to be all about 'raising standards' but mostly seems to be about undermining the autonomy of teachers?

I also think it is a lot easier politically to blame the teachers than to blame the parents.  That is the national pass time in America.  When you talk about healthcare people criticize how doctors practice medicine.  They never say the way to control costs is to get the majority of fat Americans to lose weight.  Nope its the doctors fault.