Grading Schools for Success

By Sean Scarpiello

Every day at school, students take tests to monitor their progress in class, and to help teachers gauge how well their students are doing so they can modify their lesson plans as necessary. Tests are crucial for learning to take place in school. It is easy to say that without tests, nothing would get done in school. A test is a motive to get students to learn effectively and succeed. If tests did not exist, then no one would put forth any effort studying nor showing up to class. This fact holds true in the rest of society as well. If there were not any tests, exams, inspections, or reviews in the workplace, all of civilization would crumble. Monetary return is the primary reason why every worker in the United States works hard. If workers do not make the cut, they are fired because they are ineffective. Tests set standards and help measure competency in basic knowledge as well as areas of expertise.

One of the areas which have come under much debate in recent years has been the effectiveness of school districts in the United States. The United States has slowly been dropping ranks in the field of education when compared to other countries around the world. One of the reasons for this is that the government has low standards for school districts. In other words, the tests that school districts need to pass are either non-existent or too easy to pass. The state governments need to come up with ways to raise their standards.

In Pennsylvania, students must take a standardized tests in reading, math, and science. Some high schools set a required score in order to graduate. At first, these standardized tests sound like a great idea and they have a lot of potential to ensure school districts are graduating well educated students. However, the tests are very easy. The test must be taken in the junior year of high school, but many freshmen could probably pass the test easily. This poses a problem for the quality of education in the United States.

School districts need to be tested as well. Often times, many school districts are poorly educating their students which is overlooked by ineffective inspections from the government. If the school administration, teachers, and board officials were more closely monitored, there would be a large increase in the quality of education. If students do not pass these tests coming from the government, people are at risk of losing their jobs to more effective administrators and teachers. When people’s jobs are on the line, the quality of their work will increase. Students and teachers will not succeed if they are not challenged. Therefore, if governments pushed the school districts to perform better on standardized tests, then there would be a huge improvement because there is a motive to work more effectively.

In all, giving America’s school districts their own exams to review their progress in educating students will bring a higher quality of education to students. This will allow the government to monitor school districts and make sure that every school is teaching a consistently high quality of education across the United States.

Something to Learn from Finland's Teachers

By Sean Scarpiello

Over the past few decades, Finland has done a great job at turning one of the worst education systems into one of the world’s best. One of the ways this was accomplished was by selecting better teachers. In Finland, one of ten people studying to become a teacher actually ends up being a teacher. All educators have Masters Degrees and teachers are held in high regard. Many other countries with flourishing education systems follow a similar trend. So could this be a way to improve the declining United States education system?

I think that teachers should definitely be looked upon favorably as professionals. Teachers have some of the most complicated jobs, yet receive little respect for their efforts. If teachers want to have more of society’s admiration, they need to step up their game. Districts need to be much more selective when it comes to choosing teachers. It takes a special person to be a teacher and many of today’s teachers just do not fit the mold of being a professional educator. If we can raise the bar and have a higher quality of teachers, respect will come naturally.

In my area where some teachers are making a little under $100,000 a year with full benefits, many teachers carry out the actions of a qualified professional. However, very rarely would I get a sense of true admiration for my teachers. It was hard to feel like my teachers were working for students and not for themselves. Sure, my teachers would stay after school if students needed extra help, but being a teacher does not stop there. A fantastic teacher will persist. A few times I found myself and some of my classmates leaving an after school study session even more confused than before. Even the teacher knew that the some of the students did not have a good grasp on the material as we left. This kind of performance as a teacher does not demand much appreciation.

Raising the quality of teachers in the United States would definitely aid in the quest to an improved education system in the United States. The sort of respect that teachers would automatically gain for themselves would also work out some of the other problems in America’s schools. For example, teachers that were held in high regard would run into fewer difficulties with some students who do not take school as seriously. Also, parents would play a larger role in their children’s education. Parents that received a note from the teacher would treat matters more seriously and push their children to succeed in class.

In general, a higher quality of teacher would improve the education system in the United States. Teachers would naturally be held in higher regard, much like education professionals in Finland and other parts of the world. Then, almost automatically, many problems would start to work themselves out and the United States could be back on the road to having one of the world’s best education systems again.

Source: http://www.salon.com/news/david_sirota/2011/07/18/tony_wagner_finland/index.html