Very sad

[Destroyer]

Originally Posted by RidgeRunner

I wrote- "You cannot use Japanese education at 60 plus per class as a benchmark as to what works in American children."

Destroyer said "Sure I can the rest of the world does"

I can assure you that the Japanese education system is neither a model nor consideration to anyone in the Polk County School system. Maybe the rest of the world uses it as a shining example of how it "Could be done" so a benchmark it is, but then reality sets in. It wouldn't work in the typical American classroom and doesn't work in any other society.
We are miles apart in parental obligation. They start the children young and stay on top of them. The entire family focus there is to educate their children. Non-conforming students live in shame in their society and are considered a disgrace. Here, it is acceptable and we go out of the way to study the WHY? We come up with all sorts of labels and excuses to justify the behavior and categorize. Some excuses are legitimate to be sure, medical conditions and the like, but behavioral issues should not be tolerated to the extent they are.

Ridge, I completely agree with everything you said. You are 100% correct that the Japanese system would not work here, but I was not using that system as a model of how to do it, only the fact that they do, indeed, have classes filled with students. I'm afraid that you missed my point. My point was that class size has nothing to do with learning, rather it's how the class is motivated to learn. That's where parents, teachers, and indeed, society itself, comes into play. You can have a class of 100 students and if they are all motivated, they will learn. And conversely, you can have a class of 1 student, and if that child isn't properly motivated, he or she will learn nothing. See?

[RWilson2526]

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2012...t-always-fair/

All said I believe that NJ's teachers union is good for the employees and good for the school system. This though is the only thing that I find disagreeable with our NJ teachers union.....do the head honchos really need to make 300K plus for the work they do??

[THEFERMANATOR]

Originally Posted by RWilson2526

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2012...t-always-fair/

All said I believe that NJ's teachers union is good for the employees and good for the school system. This though is the only thing that I find disagreeable with our NJ teachers union.....do the head honchos really need to make 300K plus for the work they do??

Anothe good question is why do teachers in NJ start off at $46-70K a year whereas most any other state starts off at 30-35K a year? I realize teh cost of living in Jersey is high, but alot of this I feel is brought on by the unions demanding higher pay for everybody(the whole trickle down economics).

As for the origanal discussion, I personally feel that political correctness is destroying our educational system. Since this post has started, I have questioned my wife a bit(without her knowing why) on some of the things she has to deal with as well as classroom size. I know this will come off mean and heartless to many, but why are we mainstreaming children who have actual severe learning disabilities? There are kids in her classes that can't hardly read, and will probably never be able to hold a job other than a bag boy at a grocery store. Yet these kids are in the mainstream population, so EVERY kid in the district must learn at the slowest kids rate. This in turn causes the entire state to slow down, and then rewrite the tests and how they do things so they can keep the numbers showing that the educational system is working. I know that this isn't the only issue by a long shot, and lazy parents of the nintendo generation are largely to blame for much of this as well(if the nintendo generation is this bad, imagine how bad the latest ones will be that don't socialize except for facebook).

There is much blame to go around, but I feel that alot of it can be blamed on political correctness and the whole liberal agenda.

[RWilson2526]

I don't think its true that a whole class is brought down to the level of the least abled student. This is my wife's area of expertise as she is a School Pyschologist and is responsible for designing a classified students IEP. (Individualized Education Plan). Special needs children have any combination of aids, in class support, pull out support (go into a separate class room for their studies) and greatly modified curriculum and goals set to suit their needs and abilities. And the severely disabled ones are sent out of district to a school more geared towards special needs children. (at an expense of t) At least here the mainstreaming is more for the social benefits of the child and as far as I can tell the other students don't suffer from the presence of these children. You may be right that that is how it works in Florida but it certainly is not that way here.

And yes the pay scale in NJ is one of the best for teachers although we have never seen a NJ district with a starting salary of 70K it is the norm to be in the low to mid 40's. (all the pay scales are public information and my wife looks them up frequently) But the way I look at it is the problem lies with the states that pay $32000 for a person with 6 years of college like Phatdaddy's daughter.

[THEFERMANATOR]

Originally Posted by RWilson2526

I don't think its true that a whole class is brought down to the level of the least abled student. This is my wife's area of expertise as she is a School Pyschologist and is responsible for designing a classified students IEP. (Individualized Education Plan). Special needs children have any combination of aids, in class support, pull out support (go into a separate class room for their studies) and greatly modified curriculum and goals set to suit their needs and abilities. And the severely disabled ones are sent out of district to a school more geared towards special needs children. (at an expense of t) At least here the mainstreaming is more for the social benefits of the child and as far as I can tell the other students don't suffer from the presence of these children. You may be right that that is how it works in Florida but it certainly is not that way here.

And yes the pay scale in NJ is one of the best for teachers although we have never seen a NJ district with a starting salary of 70K it is the norm to be in the low to mid 40's. (all the pay scales are public information and my wife looks them up frequently) But the way I look at it is the problem lies with the states that pay $32000 for a person with 6 years of college like Phatdaddy's daughter.

My wifes cousin will be making $68K starting salary if he gets the job he is trying for next year after he graduates. I know this is on the high end, but even the starting salary in NJ is MUCh higher than waht most seasoned teachers make elsewhere. As for IEP's, my wife has to do them as she works with alot of special needs kids(in Fl the teacher is responsible for doing teh IEP's for kids). She interned with a kid that had asburgers, and it just stuck with her since as she likes helping them. But she does feel bad though as many of them cannot keep up in a classroom envirment as they are so hiper sensitive to the enviroment. They are not challenged as far as doing the work, but they are challenged largely by there social skills(although she has had to deal with kids who just couldn't do the work, and they would get passed as the schools don't get money unless they pass them). As for discipline in the classroom, schools are now penalized(at least down here) for giving a kid a refferral and sending them to the office, so many times the office will tear up the refferral and over ride teh teacher as they don't want it on record just how many kids have discipline problems.

It would seem that every area is differrent, but as a whole our liberal agenda driven views of PC and one society is dividing us in my opinion.

[randlemanboater]

My wife has been teaching for almost 20 years and is a Nationally Certified Teacher, she doesn't make NJ starting pay.

But we don't have to live in NJ either...no offense to you NJ boiz.

[RidgeRunner]

Wilson,

Severely disabled children are sent to special schools here in FL as well. There are some students that should be considered severely disabled but are not and some that are seriously disabled that make it through with a lot of special assistance. I know some of these children personally and their parents jump the moon to make sure their child maintains at least the minimum standards so they can continue in their grade or a grade level behind. Nothing wrong with that IMO.
An example of what I meant when I said the teachers teach to the least advanced child. Assume -The first FCAT is given to 3rd graders at the end of the school year. At the beginning of the year the Third Grade teacher has 22 children and 2 are new to the school and appear to be six months behind the rest of the students in the class.(It happens every year as Florida has a large population of migrant workers, military, influx of tourist etc.) Even if none of the students were considered special needs and the two new students were fast learners the teacher has a dilemma. Passing percentiles on the FCAT will ultimately determine the teachers pay and or their job. If they want to remain a teacher, it seems like they would adapt their lesson plan to ensure the best outcome. That is what I would do and that is what they are instructed to do.
My cousin is a teacher in FL, she has her Masters and probably makes $40K a year, she works at Fruitland Park with the seriously disabled. Even though Florida requires the passing of the FCAT in order to get a diploma the school system evaluates each case and pass them through the system when it doesn't make sense to keep them in the system any longer. Sometimes children are mainstreamed because it is about development of social skills and maturation that comes with the school regiment. Even though they will be grossly unprepared, they mingle amoungst us every day. They dropped the cirriculum a while back but I do recall when public school used to teach some life lessons and even some trades. home economics, wood shop, auto shop. They need to throw in a class on Child care. Nope, they just want you passing the FCAT.

[lumberslinger178]

Originally Posted by THEFERMANATOR

Anothe good question is why do teachers in NJ start off at $46-70K a year whereas most any other state starts off at 30-35K a year? I realize teh cost of living in Jersey is high, but alot of this I feel is brought on by the unions demanding higher pay for everybody(the whole trickle down economics).

As for the origanal discussion, I personally feel that political correctness is destroying our educational system. Since this post has started, I have questioned my wife a bit(without her knowing why) on some of the things she has to deal with as well as classroom size. I know this will come off mean and heartless to many, but why are we mainstreaming children who have actual severe learning disabilities? There are kids in her classes that can't hardly read, and will probably never be able to hold a job other than a bag boy at a grocery store. Yet these kids are in the mainstream population, so EVERY kid in the district must learn at the slowest kids rate. This in turn causes the entire state to slow down, and then rewrite the tests and how they do things so they can keep the numbers showing that the educational system is working. I know that this isn't the only issue by a long shot, and lazy parents of the nintendo generation are largely to blame for much of this as well(if the nintendo generation is this bad, imagine how bad the latest ones will be that don't socialize except for facebook).

There is much blame to go around, but I feel that alot of it can be blamed on political correctness and the whole liberal agenda.

Ferm the starting salary for teachers in our district is 34-36K other towns pay a lot more ...and the closer you get to the getto the higher that salary
.... It sounds like a high starting salary but its not.... I'm not living in the lap of luxury were living week to week.