Quote of the day - Education

"To succeed, students must become thinkers, not just test-takers."
– "The secret to fixing bad schools", David L. Kirp, New York Times, 2013-02-09

I posted a comment to the article with the above quote and

"That sentence should be engraved in the head of anyone who wants successful students."

As of 8:30 this morning it had received 45 recommendations!  Gosh, if I could only have that readership here!

A former teacher replied to my post that I had beat him or her to a similar post and added

"As a teacher for 27 years, I know for a fact, that exam scores are the least important indicator of how well a student is learning."

147 comments have been posted to the article.  Three included that pre–school education may be expensive, but not as expensive as prisons.

I didn't post it, but many have written elsewhere that you pay something now or pay a lot more later.  It is often considered investing, but too many people don't think of government spending as investment, as they cruise down the interstate built with government money, as they enjoy a game in a tax-supported stadium, or as they have no concern about food-safety because of government inspections.

In defense of teachers

"Greedy teacher unions!" "Underperforming schools!" and many other simplistic slogans pollute the discussion about improving education. But more thoughtful people wonder how to counter all the other problems that make learning difficult: disinterested parents, bullies, too much testing, too little class time, and on it goes with things that are outside the control of teachers.

For a good summary of these problems, see "Teachers aren't the problem" by Micheal Kennedy, Star Tribune, 2007-06-17. Kennedy teaches at Southwest High School in Minneapolis.