So, do you think more of the students in KY will be involved in a career in science, computer programming or working with computers in a word processing, spreadsheet form.

 

Cause I would be willing to believe that MORE students will be using word processing, spreadsheets and data entry the rest of their life than looking at something in a microscope or writing a computer program.

 

Which do you use more? BTW, which are you using now when you answer my post?

 

I'm using the Typing that I learned from my 8th grade electric typewriter teacher, and thank the Maker for her!:thumb:

 

More students will use word processing and data entry, but while needed skills for many (if not all), they are not the skills required for the higher level engineering, computer programming, and scientific jobs that we need to be attracting to Kentucky to raise ourselves out of our economic rut. Therefore, though everyone needs to learn word processing, I still value and will pay considerably more for a sharp chemistry teacher who is going to send a select handful of students on to bigger and better things that they hopefully will enrich the Commonwealth.

I'm using the Typing that I learned from my 8th grade electric typewriter teacher, and thank the Maker for her!:thumb:

 

More students will use word processing and data entry, but while needed skills for many (if not all), they are not the skills required for the higher level engineering, computer programming, and scientific jobs that we need to be attracting to Kentucky to raise ourselves out of our economic rut. Therefore, though everyone needs to learn word processing, I still value and will pay considerably more for a sharp chemistry teacher who is going to send a select handful of students on to bigger and better things that they hopefully will enrich the Commonwealth.

 

And you have given a perfect example of the problems with merit pay.

 

Because my job is more of an entry level that EVERYONE WILL USE, you want to pay me less than a chemistry teacher that a very small % of the student body will ever use in their lifetime.

 

I have lived 42 years AND NEVER used the pythogarem theory, sine, cosine, tangent outside of a math classroom. Yet, using your argument they should be getting paid more than what my typing teacher taught me that I used every single day of my life.

 

You are going to pay more to the teacher for things that 95% of the student body will never use in their lives?

And you have given a perfect example of the problems with merit pay.

 

Because my job is more of an entry level that EVERYONE WILL USE, you want to pay me less than a chemistry teacher that a very small % of the student body will ever use in their lifetime.

 

I have lived 42 years AND NEVER used the pythogarem theory, sine, cosine, tangent outside of a math classroom. Yet, using your argument they should be getting paid more than what my typing teacher taught me that I used every single day of my life.

 

You are going to pay more to the teacher for things that 95% of the student body will never use in their lives?

 

LBBC, the argument is circular. Why is it that you think that only 5% of the student body ever going into anything with science? ITS BECAUSE THERE ARE NOT A LOT OF QUALIFIED SCIENCE TEACHERS OUT THERE TEACHING GOOD SCIENCE SKILLS!!!!

 

I'm sorry, I'm coming off as rakish today, but the answer to your question is "yes." I don't pay more for a teacher teaching baseline skills because there are a lot of teachers teaching baseline skills, I can get one of those teachers anytime I want and can get him at the pay rate I want. However, there are very few qualified math and science teachers. Because the supply of them is small and the increasing demand and need for them is high, they command much higher pay. It has nothing to do with the number of students that the teacher educates.

My mother was a teacher for 27 years and in no way do I think, or my family think, that she was "overpaid". If you think of the hours they put in not only in the day but at night grading papers, and if you are a really involved teacher having study sessions before every test at night... They put in about 8 hours a day at work, then come home and spend another 1-2 hours on paperwork and all that. No way they are overpaid for what they do.

And you have given a perfect example of the problems with merit pay.

 

Because my job is more of an entry level that EVERYONE WILL USE, you want to pay me less than a chemistry teacher that a very small % of the student body will ever use in their lifetime.

 

I have lived 42 years AND NEVER used the pythogarem theory, sine, cosine, tangent outside of a math classroom. Yet, using your argument they should be getting paid more than what my typing teacher taught me that I used every single day of my life.

 

You are going to pay more to the teacher for things that 95% of the student body will never use in their lives?

 

You don't use that because Geometry is pretty useless unless you are in construction or something relating to rooms with the area and such.

LBBC, the argument is circular. Why is it that you think that only 5% of the student body ever going into anything with science? ITS BECAUSE THERE ARE NOT A LOT OF QUALIFIED SCIENCE TEACHERS OUT THERE TEACHING GOOD SCIENCE SKILLS!!!!

 

I'm sorry, I'm coming off as rakish today, but the answer to your question is "yes." I don't pay more for a teacher teaching baseline skills because there are a lot of teachers teaching baseline skills, I can get one of those teachers anytime I want and can get him at the pay rate I want. However, there are very few qualified math and science teachers. Because the supply of them is small and the increasing demand and need for them is high, they command much higher pay. It has nothing to do with the number of students that the teacher educates.

 

If it was an assembly line producing identical parts, than you have a strong argument.

 

But how does merit pay handle that student in a "baseline skills" class that hates school and dropping out, but a teacher comes along and they touch that kid's heart and change their outlook on the importance of education. That kid goes from a dropout to a A-B student that ends up a contributing member of society.

 

How does merit pay handle a situation where the courts are making a 16-year old male with 1 credit stay in school and they are reading on a 1st grade level. By the time the student drops out at 18, he isn't going to graduate but he is reading at a 6th grade level and can now function in society?

 

This ain't no assembly line where every product is the same and you can value one kid's life over anothers.

 

 

Let me through another wrench in the works with your argument. One of the growing, growing problems is a lack of MALE TEACHERS. Studies show that young men would do much better with MALE role models as their teachers. You going to pay more to MEN teachers to attract them into teaching because there is a shortage of MEN teachers? If so, NOW would like your address.

And you have given a perfect example of the problems with merit pay.

 

Because my job is more of an entry level that EVERYONE WILL USE, you want to pay me less than a chemistry teacher that a very small % of the student body will ever use in their lifetime.

 

I have lived 42 years AND NEVER used the pythogarem theory, sine, cosine, tangent outside of a math classroom. Yet, using your argument they should be getting paid more than what my typing teacher taught me that I used every single day of my life.

 

You are going to pay more to the teacher for things that 95% of the student body will never use in their lives?

The true innovators in our society come from the the 5% who will use trigonometry, statistics, calculus, physics, and chemistry. To be blunt, teaching those topics effectively to the top 1%, from which future technological advances will come, is not only critical to those students' success, it is critical for the advancement of our species.

 

Kentucky schools on average (there are some notable exceptions) do a very poor job educating students who have the natural potential to become leading innovators. IMO, it is because most potentially outstanding math and science teachers elect other careers because of pay levels.

 

Reading and writing skills are in importance to math and science skills, regardless of one's career choice. However, there is an abundance of good English teachers on the market and it makes no sense not to offer higher salaries to top math and science teachers, which are in short supply.

You don't use that because Geometry is pretty useless unless you are in construction or something relating to rooms with the area and such.

 

Geometry is of foremost and constant use in computer programming, almost all forms of engineering, architecture, astronomical science, land use and surveying, and countless other professions in which it is utilized on a daily basis. The algebraic principles that LBBC was discussing are baseline skills for any engineer and form, just as one example, the fulcrum of all computer programming involving spatial equations, such as the hardware for heads-up displays on all modern aircraft.

You don't use that because Geometry is pretty useless unless you are in construction or something relating to rooms with the area and such.

 

But we spend a lot of time on it with EVERY STUDENT. We teach them tangent while they cannot add fractions, handle percents or decimals.

 

Common sense education of making sure kids know what they need to know to function in society has been put on the backburner while we chase this ideal notion that every kid is going to have a education that prepares them for YALE and Harvard.

Geometry is of foremost and constant use in computer programming, almost all forms of engineering, architecture, astronomical science, land use and surveying, and countless other professions in which it is utilized on a daily basis. The algebraic principles that LBBC was discussing are baseline skills for any engineer and form, just as one example, the fulcrum of all computer programming involving spatial equations, such as the hardware for heads-up displays on all modern aircraft.

 

About the only part of this post I understood is ..... LBBC.

 

Seriously, my complaint is that this is a requirement of EVERY COTTON-PICKIN' student to learn.

 

We are trying to cookie cutter kids into all the same person and they ain't buying it.

 

There are students who cannot add fractions, decimals or multiply percents and we are not allowed to teach them things they will need to know every single day of their lives BECAUSE we need to teach them tangent, matrices.

 

Heck when I had to teach matrices, I didn't even know what they were. But I am trying to convince a 17 year old that hates school that it is important for him to learn it. When he asked me if I have ever used them in my life, I had to be honest and say no.

If it was an assembly line producing identical parts, than you have a strong argument.

 

But how does merit pay handle that student in a "baseline skills" class that hates school and dropping out, but a teacher comes along and they touch that kid's heart and change their outlook on the importance of education. That kid goes from a dropout to a A-B student that ends up a contributing member of society.

 

How does merit pay handle a situation where the courts are making a 16-year old male with 1 credit stay in school and they are reading on a 1st grade level. By the time the student drops out at 18, he isn't going to graduate but he is reading at a 6th grade level and can now function in society?

 

This ain't no assembly line where every product is the same and you can value one kid's life over anothers.

 

 

Let me through another wrench in the works with your argument. One of the growing, growing problems is a lack of MALE TEACHERS. Studies show that young men would do much better with MALE role models as their teachers. You going to pay more to MEN teachers to attract them into teaching because there is a shortage of MEN teachers? If so, NOW would like your address.

 

For the third straight post, you have converted a discussion of teacher pay into a focus upon students, and for the third straight response, I'm telling you that it is not about students, it is about economics. The students are not on an "assembly line." And I will pay a male science teacher more than a female word processing teacher, because he teaches science, not because he is a man.

The true innovators in our society come from the the 5% who will use trigonometry, statistics, calculus, physics, and chemistry. To be blunt, teaching those topics effectively to the top 1%, from which future technological advances will come, is not only critical to those students' success, it is critical for the advancement of our species.

 

Kentucky schools on average (there are some notable exceptions) do a very poor job educating students who have the natural potential to become leading innovators. IMO, it is because most potentially outstanding math and science teachers elect other careers because of pay levels.

 

Reading and writing skills are in importance to math and science skills, regardless of one's career choice. However, there is an abundance of good English teachers on the market and it makes no sense not to offer higher salaries to top math and science teachers, which are in short supply.

 

I agree with your first paragraph immensely.

 

But should EVERY STUDENT be REQUIRED to learn that?

 

What is your definition of a good English teacher? I would counter that there is not since the reading level of students are a growing problem.

For the third straight post, you have converted a discussion of teacher pay into a focus upon students, and for the third straight response, I'm telling you that it is not about students, it is about economics. The students are not on an "assembly line." And I will pay a male science teacher more than a female word processing teacher, because he teaches science, not because he is a man.

 

That is an intriguing response.

 

The one who produces more, is more effective in their student's using what they produce, and will effect more lives

 

gets paid less.

 

I think there are other ways to attract good teachers into science and math besides creating disharmony in the schools because of teacher's pay.

 

I think you can have programs that forgive student loans if they teach in these fields for X number of years.

 

 

BTW, you dartfully danced around my question. There is a SEVERE shortage of MALE ELEMENTARY TEACHERS. Would you pay more for them than females, so that you can attract more male elementary teachers?

 

Also, how would your pay affect elementary teachers that teach all subjects?

But we spend a lot of time on it with EVERY STUDENT. We teach them tangent while they cannot add fractions, handle percents or decimals.

 

Common sense education of making sure kids know what they need to know to function in society has been put on the backburner while we chase this ideal notion that every kid is going to have a education that prepares them for YALE and Harvard.

Surveying requires a sound understanding of geometry and trigonometry and as a former supervisor of many surveyors, I can assure you that none of them were Ivy League graduates. In fact, none of them graduated from any college, although there are certainly many people engaged in surveying who do have college degrees.

 

The fact is, many young people who become surveyor require some remedial on the job trigonometry training because few of them receive an adequate math education in high school.

 

It saddens me to see foreign students outnumbering American students in our own colleges in science, math, and computer science on an increasing number of campuses.

For the third straight post, you have converted a discussion of teacher pay into a focus upon students, and for the third straight response, I'm telling you that it is not about students, it is about economics. The students are not on an "assembly line." And I will pay a male science teacher more than a female word processing teacher, because he teaches science, not because he is a man.

 

For the record, any discussion with a teacher, you are going to get the bolded because a good teacher, their focus is about the kids. Any educational issue is going to be about the kids.

 

Even if it is the health care issue that someone, I think it was you raised. They did that and I would probably have to leave education to be able to support my kids. I try to stay out of being arrogant and bragging but I feel I try my dardnest and care about my kids and that would be a loss to them. Other teachers have called me insane for teaching the kids I do and are dumbfounded when they learn I CHOSE to teach the kids I do.

 

So, loss of health insurance benefits as you suggested, I think it was you, is a "focus on the students" because it would be running good teachers out of the system.