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Education Today

Since I send my children to private school, yet pay my local taxes, I still feel I have a voice in how the local public school district should conduct themselves. I have absolutely NO love for the Teachers Unions. They only care for the teachers and not for the students. My local school district is rate low on scholastic achievement and THE highest in weapons possession. This is why we've always had our children in parochial school. I may not be Catholic, but they teach a fine lesson!!

One of my daily sites is 'Q and O', a libertarian site. Bruce McQuain has an excellent post on education. There are some interesting graphs that just make you shake your head.

Here's the take-away paragraph from the post:

Japan spends about 5% of its GDP on education, pays its teachers the equivalent of $25,000 US, has average class sizes of 33 and graduates 93% of its students from their equivalent of high school. South Korea actually spends more of its GDP than does the US (7.35%), pays its teachers a little over $27,000 US, has huge average class sizes (almost 36) and has a graduation rate of 91.23%. The US’s stats are 7.38% GDP, average teacher’s salary of almost $36,000, average class size of 19 and a graduation rate at a dismal 77.53%.

Charts of the day – do we really need more teachers?
October 1st, 2010 | Author: Bruce McQuain

Apparently the president’s job initiative centers around hiring 10,000 more union teachers.

The reason given is we need to beef up our math and science achievement. And, as usual, the way to do that is to throw either more money or more teachers at the job.

What everyone ignores, however, is we’ve been doing both for years with no change. What’s the definition of insanity again?





So for an approximate 10% rise in enrollment, we’ve added 10 more public school employees for every student. And we’ve also seen the spending go through the proverbial roof as a result. The normal, everyday, tax paying citizen would most likely expect spectacular results if he or she invested the amount they were taxed in something of their choice. Instead, they end up screwed again:



Looking at those two charts, does anyone think the problem is related only to the money spent or the number of teachers?

Japan spends about 5% of its GDP on education, pays its teachers the equivalent of $25,000 US, has average class sizes of 33 and graduates 93% of its students from their equivalent of high school. South Korea actually spends more of its GDP than does the US (7.35%), pays its teachers a little over $27,000 US, has huge average class sizes (almost 36) and has a graduation rate of 91.23%. The US’s stats are 7.38% GDP, average teacher’s salary of almost $36,000, average class size of 19 and a graduation rate at a dismal 77.53%.

To most that would signal that something is wrong other than the number of teachers or what we’re spending. Somehow, however, that message seems never to get through to our political leaders who continually work under the premise that more money and more bodies is bound, at some point, to make it all better.

That thinking, In this case, given the word pictures the two charts paint, it is obviously wrong. When and how we can get that message across to both sides of the political spectrum remains to be seen. But if the left wants to invoke the “for the children” canard in an attempt to shame the right into capitulating for the usual remedies, maybe they can put these two charts in their pockets and make one up of the comparative spending and graduation rates and change not only the discussion, but the solution. My guess the new solution would take less people and less money. Wouldn’t the taxpayers love that?

~McQ

I don't expect teachers to raise our children, that's the job of parents. Until we get parents to really care about their children's education we'll be hard pressed to hold teachers accountable for test scores.

peace