I’ve heard this myth so many times in my career. In the name of diversity, school administrations and school boards bend over backwards to hire a “diverse” teaching force. The rationale is repeated over and over, “kids learn best from people who look like them.”
It’s a strange statement considering the fact that during my years as a student and a teacher I never saw evidence that it was true.
Here’s the truth. Kids learn best from master teachers regardless of their background, skin color, nationality, gender, etc. I worked with many of these master teachers throughout my career. From Brookings Institute:
Research typically finds that teachers are the most important component of formal education, and quality instruction one of the biggest contributors to student learning. A 2018 World Bank report on global and regional assessments in Africa found that teacher knowledge, teaching practice, and instructional time were the “most consistent sources of impact on student learning.” Teachers often get to know—and become invested in—children and their families for months, sometimes years at a time and teachers’ efforts not only influence students’ academic achievement but also their long-term success and well-being.
Someone please tell the State of Maryland because they have hung student success on something very different; “diversity.” It would be fine if diversity meant different approaches to teaching, tools for working with students who have different needs, or even novel and creative ways to help students achieve. But the state is determined to link teacher quality by matching of teacher’s physical, superficial characteristics to those of their students.
Here’s a troubling headline from Maryland Matters:
If you want the best results/performance…you have to hire/retain the best. DEI/Affirmative Action has no proof of results. I want the best possible teacher teaching my kids. I don’t care what color their skin is. As a manager, I want the best possible employee so we can hit our budget goals…skin color makes no difference to me.
DEI / Affirmative Action has proof of negative results….
Obama…
Harris…
Sotomayor…
Admiral…
Leveling the playing field shouldn’t mean lowering expectations.
When we’re discussing the board of education you must understand that they are a group that can fail consistently and never be fired. They are experts at spending money. They have NEVER had their budget reduced, yet expect more every year even though the education level of our students goes down. As a teacher I see many students graduate with a fourth grade reading level, or worse. AND NOONE CARES.
The lowly taxpayers DO care but we are treated with contempt and disdain by the parasites who have taken over public education. It is the LOVE of money that is the root of all evil.
Public school teachers are massively underpaid. The fact that you think the issue here is greed and are calling teachers parasites is just proof you have zero clue what you’re talking about. Do you even have kids in the school system?
Read it again. I never called TEACHERS the parasites,
The heart of the problem is the federal government weening all public school districts onto federal funds to operate. Now that they’re all getting the funding, they have to continue with it in order to operate. That comes strings attached in that they have to do what the federal government wants them to do or they will withhold funding. That means teach what they want, serve the food they want (thanks Michelle), carry the books they want, etc.
The department of education should be absolved. It serves no purpose, and is in fact failing our country, as our children fall further and further behind the rest of the civilized world.
As a teacher, who moved here from Youngstown, Ohio, I can tell you that I never knew incompetence until I saw my coworkers who were hired under ‘diversity measures’. Quite frankly, I would not let any of those hires anywhere near my personal kids. I’ve found them to be the racists they accuse me of being. I have seen quite a few that were rude, unprofessional, and unable to articulate and speak grammatically correctly, yet they are hired. Nearly all do not have basic competencies, let alone morals or any real work ethic and are, frankly, an embarrassment.
1:49……………..You are absolutely 100% correct!!!