Poorly Funded Public Schools (Continued) (9 Paragraphs)

Why Do Bad Teachers Exist?

            Many people become a teacher because they have a passion for teaching. Some teacher’s passion last longer than other teachers, while some lose it in a year. However, only a few people’s passion will come back while others quit or resign. This is creates a bad teacher if he/she chooses to stay.  A loss of passion can ruin everything that the teacher is doing for the class. Students would learn less, have a lower grade, and be unprepared for the next year’s course. I had a firsthand experience with this in my high school senior year in my English class. My teacher gave up during mid-year because of a certain situation that happened at school. The teacher didn’t have a passion to teach us anymore and the class was basically useless every day. Many students skipped out on class because they knew it would be boring and we would be getting the same lecture every day. There was no new pattern in the class. A good teacher in this sense would shake off the situation that happened and focused on the students. The problems that he had outside of the classroom should not affect the student’s education. Every student’s education is as important as anyone else’s.

            Students can also get the wrong idea of what the teacher is trying to do by setting goals for the class that don’t have anything to do with the subject. Ever since President George Bush published the “No Child Left Behind” act, many teachers have only been focusing on what the students have learned in the year. I have been told by my math teacher that school districts want to end up on top of other districts every year.  They want to be the best around their area to reach a certain goal to get a set amount of money for their school, so they have meetings with all the Principals and all the Principals then have meetings with all the teachers in their school. They want to make sure that the teachers students test scores is at least the average in the nation. The higher the better but at least aim for average. This is what makes students think that some teachers are bad. Students might wonder why the teacher goes over one particular thing over and over again, but the reason is because the teacher wants to integrate it into student’s head that ‘this is what you need to know for the state exam’.  Certain teachers focus more on the state exam more than other teachers. They want to meet a certain standard so it doesn’t make them seem like a bad teacher compared to other ones in the district. Teaching also gets very competitive at times but everything leads back to teaching the students in a correct manner.

            For some schools, teachers do not have a choice of being good or bad. The poorly funded public schools most likely do not have the type of resources that other schools have. The material to teach a class is missing and the school does not have the money to buy the material. A lot of this happens with science classes. Labs are just as important as the lecture class. The things I have seen in the lab helps me a lot in my test taking for the science class. The current Biology class I am taking with the Laboratory every week requires a lot of materials to get the lesson done. If the class was missing a lot of the material, students would automatically turn to the teacher for a resolution. The teacher obviously cannot do anything about it so it seems like they are the bad guy in the situation. These teachers could easily be labeled as a bad teacher even though it is not their fault. There was nothing for them to do about it but try their hardest at making the lectures useful. This is a type of unlucky bad teacher but really, they have the potential to be a great teacher if the school had enough resources.

Why can’t we get rid of the teachers?

            Teachers used to be easy to find a decade ago when it was still a decent paying job and was a great choice in an occupation. However, the past few years were hard for teachers because of how much they were getting paid each year. This was a red flag to many people who were about to go into the occupation of teaching. People reconsidered the job and some chose new different routes to take in their life. Of course there were still people who wanted to be a teacher and carried through with it. But the amount of teachers quitting is too high compared to the number of teachers getting their credentials. One of my best science teachers in whole life worked as a teacher for a while before he had to quit and move on because his family is very important to him. He told us he was very sorry for leaving but his family needs the money. He had two children and wanted his kids to go to a very good school to get good education. One of his friends had a job opening and he told my science teacher about it. The new occupation he went into was selling sofas. My teacher would make more money in a year selling sofa than teaching students science. In the moral of this story, teachers don’t make enough for more teachers to come in and take their place, so people just choose to not be a teacher in that particular school. When that happens, teachers aren’t able to find a replacement for that teacher even if they are a bad teacher. The district doesn’t have a choice but to let them stay even though the students aren’t learning anything.

            Even if a district finds a teacher to replace the one that will leave of left, it is not that easy. Districts do not just hire any teacher that walks in the door with an education for the right subject their looking for. They look for someone who is reliable and will do a good job in teaching the students the material. They want them to be able to connect with the students and make sure that they will not harm the students in anyway. So the districts cannot let go of a teacher any time they want. They need to find a good replacement for that one teacher before the teacher is let go of. Something else that schools look for is experience. The more experience that the teacher has will increase the chance of getting them getting the job compared to others with no experience. Take my English teacher in high school for example, he gave up half way through the year but the school district could not let him go because they did not have a reliable replacement for my English teacher. They couldn’t let go of him whenever they want or the following year. Schools have to go through a lot before getting rid of a teacher. They have to plan ahead before they make a final decision especially on the causes and effects of letting go of a teacher.

            Teachers also like to protect other teachers from being fired from their school. The union combines and doesn’t allow certain teachers to be fired because of the affects it will have on the department if he/she is gone. This usually happens with teachers that have been teaching at the school for a very long time. They seniority and cannot be fired as easily as other teachers there who have been working there for a short time. This also matters a lot if the teacher makes a great impact in the school. Even if the district and Principals don’t like the teacher, the union will compromise and make sure some teachers do not get let go of. There are a lot of similar ideas like this with other companies. Take BART for example, the union workers came together and didn’t allow themselves to work so they could come in agreement with the government to get a raise. When teachers all come together to protect each other, the district cannot do anything about it. Teachers will stand firm and if they do not get in an agreement, teachers do go on strike. It has happened at my school before where teachers marched around the front of the school and not working in the middle of class. This is why some schools cannot get rid of these teachers.

What standards should we hold teachers to?

            Parents, districts, and principals all hold their teacher to a certain standard. If not all, many of them want to find a teacher that will be fair. It is never okay to favor certain person at school or anywhere. It can hurt that particular person or more than just that person. Some people strongly dislike teachers who play favorites. It puts other student’s grades down while it raises a few individuals’ grades higher. Students can only hope for the teacher is fair to them. Their grade depends on the teacher on how they grade papers and other activities in the classroom. Going back to my high school senior English teacher, before he lost his passion for teaching, he was also playing favorites with the smarter kids in class. If a student was on their phone in class and was caught, their phone would usually be taken away until the end of class. However, if my English teacher liked the student, he would not care about him/her. He would wave it off and just tell the student to put their phone away and when it happens again, my teacher says the same thing where as a student he didn’t favor had their phone taken away on the first warning. This is an example of a teacher who is being unfair and not using the same level of consequences for each student. Districts and principals should hold these teachers accountable for being fair to all students inside and outside of class.

            Teachers should always have standard to help students to succeed. They should not only teach the information but to help them learn the information. This is how students will be successful in the future. Once they pick up on the subject and get the hang of it, they should be able to pass the class with a minimal amount of help. Certainly, there will be students who need help more than others, so that is where teachers need to be available for students when they need help. One of the best math teachers I have had in my high school years always made herself available to students during the week. Two times a week she would open up her classroom to any students who want help in math. It didn’t matter if the student was in her class or not; she would help students regardless. Even though some students saw her as a very mean and strict teacher, I saw her as one of the most helpful and kind teachers I have ever seen. She made sure her students passed the class by pushing them to the limits. I left the class knowing so much more than before. When students ask me about her, I recommend her every single time because they are guaranteed to learn more than they expect. This is a perfect example of how teachers can care and help students to succeed. Even though she knows she gets paid way too little for the things she does for students, she does it because she cares about us. She cares about our future and what we will become in the future.

            Another thing we should hold teachers to is being able to make students excited to go to class. All students like a teacher who is exciting and fun, but obviously not all teachers are capable of doing so. It is important for all students to get to class on time every time they have class. During high school/ college, many students skipped out on class because they found that the teacher or class is boring. Teachers should have at least some sort of exciting activities for the class. This can range from anywhere in group work/ talks to games for the whole class. The current communications class right now is a teacher who loves to bring the class together and have fun. All the activities we do in class or outside of class have always related to the chapter we are learning in the textbook. The most recent activity we played in class had to do with different types of cultures communicating with others. Each group of 5 people had a set of rules they had to follow when they communicated with other groups. We all learned a valuable lesson with the one activity because every time the teacher said stop, we looked around and we were much guaranteed to be next to someone that was in the same group. We were all very surprised by how the lesson turned out because none of us saw it coming. Those are the kind of activities that brings the class together and keep the students coming back to class to learn more about different cultures. Teachers should not only just teach the materials straight forward like they are forced to, they should make the class exciting by tell students what they are going to be doing soon so it makes them excited about going to class every day. The higher the attendance can lead to a higher participation grade which can ultimately lead to a better grade in the class. These standards should always be kept with teachers where ever they teach.