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Originally Posted by Kevin
I'm not really saying anything about "fast." My argument is more along the lines of the fact that traditional educational structures and salaries are not attracting and retaining the best candidates for teaching positions.
There are some innovative programs out there, most geared at getting kids out of the classroom and into practicums ASAP. I'm not sure whether that's the answer.
Another model which has been somewhat successful (although I have veeerrrry mixed feelings about it) is Teach For America. My biggest issue with that program is that it seems to be a band aid for a bullet hole. First, the turnover for TFA positions is pretty high. Also, traditionally trained teachers don't like the program and its graduates because they feel (and I somewhat agree) that it deprofessionalizes their profession, and I think that does and should affect morale somewhat. But TFA admittedly has done good things.
NCLB is a good thing because it does help us to force accountability onto a system which was otherwise obsessed with preserving the status quo despite in many cases being by all accounts failed and going nowhere. NCLB helps us put the focus back onto serving the students rather than serving institutions and teachers. Ultimately, there will be thousands of good teachers and administrators who will probably be casualties -- and I feel for them -- but they need to know that it's not about them.
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But again, it's typically more the dumb reaction to the law by districts rather than the law itself that causes good teachers grief.
Something else to consider is that as the general economy stinks, teaching looks like a more attractive career. It would be a bad way to count on attracting people long term, but I think it could drive up quality in the short term, if coupled with new methods of evaluation and a stronger commitment from principals to explore removing bad or weak teachers.*
New York's "rubber rooms" are notorious, and there are some states where the unions are powerful enough to have compelled contracts clearly not in the students' best interest. However, in many states it's simply an unwillingness to consistently do the paper work that keeps bad teachers employed. Yes, you have "tenure" after so many years, but it doesn't guarantee employment if you are incompetent. And yep, a good principal could document incompetence if he or she wanted to and had the discipline to follow through. In fact, I suspect it doesn't require that much more work than most HR departments put into firing any employee in a big company that worries about lawsuits.
*I want to note that this is totally different than getting rid of unpopular teachers. Some of the absolutely most effective teachers are the ones whose classes kids try to weasel out of. Students are often very willing to sit through a bad teacher's class if it's fun or simply easy. (I don't say that because kids try to get out of my class as much as what I see with the preparation level of the kids in the grades I teach. The best prepared come from a teacher that the kids and parents cause grief about every year, mainly because she had high standards. If we had pay for performance based on student achievement, I think she'd be compensated very well. Interestingly, she doesn't even teach a grade that has a state test.)