Have you ever sat in class and wished
your teacher wouldn’t be so boring? Well if so, many students empathize with
you. However, it is not always our teachers’ fault for “being boring.” The
educational system has many challenges facing it and teachers are, at times, are
not given the creative liberties to teach something interesting. Also, teachers
are given the short end of the stick because they are generally given way too
many students per class and they are not paid nearly as much as they should be
paid. These challenges make it problematic for students to learn, but the
solutions to these problems are not easy to implement. They require taking
risks, which may seem difficult for some education leaders to employ, but if
anything is going to change, then something has to be done.
One
major problem with education is overcrowding in schools. When teachers have
class sizes that surpass 40, it becomes difficult for every student to get the
attention they need. Teachers have trouble getting to know all their students
on a personal level and therefore have difficulty relating to them. Subsequently,
these teachers with too many students cannot understand how to address certain
problems with each student, which may impede their learning. As a student at a
private institution, my teachers take an interest in my learning and get to
know me as a person inside and outside of the classroom. Because of this
personalized attention, I feel engaged during class and I strive to put forth
my maximum effort because I am interested in learning. Also, my teachers make
themselves accessible whenever I need any extra help; they are available before
school, during lunch, and after school so that it is more convenient for me to
get the help I need. In addition, I feel completely comfortable asking my
teachers for assistance when new topics are becoming jumbled in my head,
however, this is typically not the case for students who have overcrowding in
their schools. Teachers at these schools, have too many papers to grade, so
they struggle to put aside time for their students to visit them when they are
struggling; generally this leads to frustration by the student and once again
he/she will become disinterested in school.
Also,
with overcrowding, teachers have a harder time remembering all their students
by name, and they end up becoming a number. When a teacher forgets or does not
know a student’s name, the student is generally offended and becomes
disinterested in school and less likely to pay attention in class. This summer,
working as a Breakthrough Miami teacher, many of my students explained how
different their schools are compared to Breakthrough and how they enjoyed
Breakthrough classes much better than actual school because they said their
school teachers did not care about them and did not take the time to help them
or offer them extra help when they were struggling. Many of my students also
said they were impressed that I remembered their names after the first day
because at their middle schools, their teachers constantly mixed up their names
with other students’.
One
solution to the problem of overcrowding is to make a limit on how many students
can enroll in each class at a certain school. A teacher should not have to
teach more than 30 students per section and they should not have to teach more
than 3 sections for a block schedule or 5 sections for normal periods.
Typically, more than 150 students are attending a public school, therefore more
teachers need to be hired. With more teachers qualified to teach the same
class, the students can be evenly separated between the teachers so that no one
teacher has to teach math for example to half of the sixth graders at one
school. Though it may sound expensive to add new teachers to the payroll, 48%
of local taxes go to education, 44% of state taxes go to education, and 8% of
federal taxes go to education (data-first.org). This funding from the
government goes towards maintaining the upkeep of the school and making sure
the school can continue to operate. Accordingly, the government funds teacher
salaries and it may be arduous to add more teachers to the payroll because the
funds may not be available, which leads to the next challenge facing education.
There
is a lack of funds for education. Whenever the government needs to cut back on
their spending, it is usually targeted at education. Teachers, arguably, have
the hardest job because they are responsible for the development and growth of
their student’s intellectual curiosity. Therefore, they should be paid
according to effectiveness as a teacher. To solve this problem, higher percentages
of our local and state taxes should go towards education. Though this may cut
funds for other important and necessary programs, education is by far the most
important on that list and should receive the money it needs to ensure teachers
are receiving the correct amount of pay for the job they are doing in the
classroom.
Similarly,
Teacher Unions prove to be a continued challenge for our educational system.
Teacher Unions allow teachers to vote against the reforms needed to improve
education by putting a focus on the teachers rather than on the students they
are teaching. These Unions also protect “bad teachers.” If a teacher is seen as
ineffective, he/she can be sent to the “Rubber Room,” where nearly 700 teachers
are sitting in a room being paid their teacher’s salary for doing whatever they
want from 8 to 5 everyday. This is absurd because people are being paid to do
nothing and the funds going to pay these teachers in the “Rubber Room” are
coming from the government and therefore are using up education funds on
worthless things (teachersunionsexposed.com).
Teacher
Unions are extremely powerful; these Unions have made it possible that “bad
teachers” cannot be fired. “Bad teachers” are either sent to the “Rubber Room”
or they are bounced around from one school to the next, hoping the school was
the wrong fit for them and they will excel in other environments. The problem
with having bad teachers remain on the payroll is that it decreases the funding
for other teachers who deserve the money and it takes away from their students’
learning. A “bad teacher” is the teacher who comes into class and sits as
his/her desk doing his/her own thing, not paying attention to their students.
Kids go to school to receive an education, not be to baby-sat for eight hours.
Students deserve better than a “bad teacher;” they deserve someone who is
invested in their education and will go to any extremes to guarantee every one
of their students has learned something at the end of the school year.
The
only way to fix this problem is by eliminating Teacher Unions, which will not
be an easy feat. Because Teacher Unions are so powerful, they are able to
reject what the education leaders try to implement to reform education. If “bad
teachers” were removed from the payroll, this would allow for more funding for
better teachers and a raise for teachers who have worked as an educator for
many years and have done their jobs effectively. If there were a monetary
incentive for teachers to teacher their students as much as possible in the
most effective ways, many teachers would be willing to put forth the effort
because it would result in a payoff, which is generally the issue they complain
about. However, the problem becomes how to weaken Teacher Unions. One
possibility is to give teachers certain benefits to persuade them from joining
a Union. These benefits can include, a higher salary for those who are not a
member of a Teacher’s Union or ensure that a teacher cannot be fired within the
first five years of becoming a teacher because the adjustment may be more
difficult than some anticipate. After five years, though, if a teacher proves
to be wasting their student’s time and not being productive during class, then
the teacher should rightfully asked to leave.
The
final major challenge facing the education system is standardized testing. All
year, teachers teach towards the test; every activity is supposed to prepare
one for the test. However, no real learning is taking place when a teacher has
to teach for a final examination. The quote on quote learning in the classroom
becomes robotic and students are not learning what is interesting to them.
Again, the problem of boredom arises and students become disinterested in
school and have a lack of motivation to do their assignments, which in turn
becomes frustrating for the teacher. Also, standardized tests do not test one’s
knowledge; they merely test to see if you can figure out the tricks of the
test. Therefore, the tests do not test everyone fairly; some people may be
great test takers, while others struggle with test taking and people learn
differently. Some students may be able to watch a film and grasp the knowledge from
an visual standpoint, while others may be able to listen to a lector and
remember the key ideas from an auditory perspective, and even others find it
easier to learn when they have hands-on activities, which is a kinesthetic
learner. These three learning types should be incorporated into every teacher’s
lesson so that every student can succeed. However standardized tests do not
take into account what type of learner one may be and the presentation of the
material may be detrimental to their success.
Standardized
tests are used in public elementary and middle schools as a measure for who has
mastered the learning for that age level and who should move on to the next
grade level. Standardized tests are also used in high school as a measure of
comparing students from around the country for a spot at a certain college. The
state standardized tests should be done away with because then teachers can
teach their students interesting topics and there is not pressure for a teacher
to teach towards a test. Also, if a teacher has to ability to choose topics to
teach his/her class, they can choose topics that their students want to learn
and the learning becomes more engaging and the students take a liking to
learning. The teacher should be able to say at the end of the year, who should
and should not continue to the next grade level based on the activities they
did in that class. Now many people may worry that there is no way to compare
students with standardized tests, but all students do not learn the same way
and what one learned form one activity, another might have learned something
different. The key to schools is learning and education, not how well one can
perform on a test.
Standardized
testing for college should also be done away with because students already have
many distinguishing factors on their resume and their application should be
enough proof of whether the student is eligible for a certain school. Though
some colleges use standardized tests scores as a measure for merit-based
scholarships, these colleges can use other parts of the application as a
measure or they can require students to write an essay or do a creative project
to show why they have earned the scholarship.
All
in all, there are many challenges that face the education system and many of
the solutions involve taking a risk on a new type of system, but if educators
and the government are ready for a serious changes, they need to take some
risks and try new ideas until something starts to work. Without creative installments
into a classroom, students become bored and disinterested in school, which is
frustrating for everyone and no real learning is occurring. I hope there is a
serious change to our educational system because kids do not deserve to have
anything but a rewarding education. Lastly, if things do not change, we, as a
country, will continue to fall farther behind other improving countries and our
current governmental problems will never be fixed because there will not be
anyone able enough without a proper education; it is a downward spiral if our
educational system is not changed soon.
This is fantastic article & really it's valuable.
ReplyDeleteto get more about educational purpose to get here :
Shiksha Hub