<p>anxiousmom, I did not mean to insult you and I certainly don’t mean to insult teachers. I’ve had terrific teachers. What I criticize is the “educational degree”. If you read my original post I mention that there ARE some respected teacher programs, degrees. But all in all, most of the education degrees seem worthless to me.</p>
<p>My favorite teacher has a PHD in history from Michigan. He does not have a degree in education. My other favorite has been teaching for 30+ years and she is one course short of having a PHD; again no formal “training” with a degree called education. (She teaches Spanish Literature).</p>
<p>I like teachers. I just don’t like the expensive/questionable education degrees.</p>
<p>Just to clarify my perspective: I once attended a small school where the teachers had degrees from places like “Smallwood”. These teachers were not as smart as their 5th grade students. It was ridiculous.</p>
<p>whiteagle, You didn’t mean to insult teachers when you said that the majority of teachers were basically teaching because they were too stupid to do anything else? My daughter, a teacher, is an intelligent hard working young woman that is certified in three states and graduated from a tiny college in the middle of the country. To get in to her teaching program she had to have a B avg. and graduated with highest honors. She’s smarter then any fifth graders that I know.</p>
<p>kathiep, I have never said “stupid” in relation to teachers once. Is the education degree “stupid”? Yes, I think it is. And by the way, I’ve heard that this there is a large academic debate about this very issue.</p>
<p>whiteagle - This sounds like stupid to me, “But in the majority of the “heartland” (i.e. Northeast Missouri State University, East Texas State, etc) those educations are mostly for kids with low SATs and little hope of really passing on knowledge. JMO.” </p>
<p>I’m going to agree that the education programs need an overhaul but when it’s done correctly, I think they turn out qualified teachers.</p>
<p>I heard someone discussing the NEAG school at UConn which is pretty prestigious in the education world and hard to get into. They were saying that they produce a lot of administrators, not many stay as teachers, being very bright. One older gentleman (a professor there?) said the “dummying down” of teaching happened when women weren’t just offered nursing and teaching positions and the quality started to drop. Some schools he went on, take 400 SAT scores, the students barely pass and they really aren’t qualified to teach. The conversation went on and was depressing although he thought that having more reviews and stricter admissions standards to begin with, would help.
My sister was lamenting the same thing about some nursing programs. When she went, even for LPN, if you dropped below a 90, you were out. A teacher told her now, she is told to pass unacceptable students and actually quit teaching a night class because it was too hard to turn a blind eye.
There are no easy answers, but I feel for all the great educators that are lumped into the pack with other less qualified, but who is to blame for that?</p>
<p>I had some great high school teachers, very motivating and some bad, same as many schools. The younger ones though were usually the worst. The cool English teacher that talked more about hockey and sports, the Cornell grad that was a musician at night and hardly ever handed back your homework. It was the hard, caring teachers that made college and beyond easier, not the fun ones. For them it was an easy BA/MA and steady check, some even admitted it!</p>
<p>While most of my kids’ teachers have been wonderful (truly wonderful!), there have been some bad ones in the mix.</p>
<p>There was a study in the past, and it was shown that the elementary-education majors had the lowest SAT scores, on average, on various campuses. That study did suggest that some students choose that major, because their math, English, and science skills were not strong enough to choose other majors. </p>
<p>It could be argued that by allowing students into el-ed with low SAT scores lessens the integrity and the reputation of the profession and taints the degree for those who are strong students.</p>
<p>Debruns- I have posted this before but the fact that women now have more and better choices for employment have removed the greatest subsidy that medicine and teaching ever had.</p>
<p>I am not a fan of all education courses but there are some necessary education related classes that need to be taught. Just because you are expert in a subject area does not make you a good/great teacher.
Get future teachers into the classroom early and teach them to control a class, how to convey the material and also how to develop a course sequence. I am sure there are others.</p>