Post by Bob LeChevalierPost by pubkeybreakerPost by RowleyThings "outside their control" are still part of the process.. and as
such do need to be included as part of an evaluation (IMO)....
Horsesh*t
Wrong again.
Post by Bob LeChevalierPost by pubkeybreakerResponsibility and Authority are converses of one another.
To have authority without responsibility is a recipe for disaster.
To be given responsibility without any authority is grossly unfair.
Who said that they have NO authority?
Very little. They are expected to take a heterogeneous
bunch of kids, most of whom do not care if they learn
anything, and many of whom are not prepared for the class
being taken, and get almost all of them to achieve a
"passing" performance. They cannot kick out the ones who
are there only because they are of the appropriate age, but
have no ability. They cannot kick out those who disrupt
the class.
Post by Bob LeChevalierPost by pubkeybreakerTo have "things outside their control" be part of the evaluation
process
is imposing responsibility on the teacher without giving them the
authority
to act.
Sorta like "life", in other words.
Do those CEOs that ran their companies into the ground get absolved of
responsibility merely because they couldn't control housing prices (or
some other variable?)
Those CEOs were doing a better job than the
Congresscritters who were supposed to run the system. A
few CEOs could have managed to guess right and get out at
the right time, or have enough foresight, like the Ford
CEO, to get a mortgage at the right time to have liquidity
in a depression. If there was no meltdown in the system,
these CEOs who did not go down would have looked bad.
Post by Bob LeChevalierThat's what being a professional means. Knowing that there are some
factors outside your control, and managing to pull off a success
anyway. That's why they get paid more than minimum wage.
But the CEO of a manufacturing company can refuse to take
substandard raw material. Teachers are required to take
all the stupes thrown at them, and be expected to teach
them what many of them cannot or will not learn.
Post by Bob LeChevalierOf course the evaluation should take into account that there are
factors outside the teacher's control.
Post by pubkeybreakerTeachers can not force students to do assignments, read the textbook,
take notes, study the material, etc. etc. They are given neither the
authority nor the means to do so.
To evaluate a teacher based upon his/her failure to teach sociopaths,
drug addicts, apathetic, and just plain stupid students, without
giving him/her the authority to PUNISH students for their failure, is just
INSANE.
Given that they cannot (or will not) be given such authority, are you
in favor of absolving teachers of all responsibility to do any sort of
teaching? Why should we pay them?
Who said that? They should be allowed to teach subject
matter to those ready to take that subject matter, and be
graded on how well they perform, taking into account the
quality of their students.
Post by Bob LeChevalierPost by pubkeybreakerThe way to motivate students is to make something that they WANT contigent
upon learning the material, {i.e. they get a reward], combined with
a punishment that they truly don't like for their failure.
So you favor proposals to pay students a salary for attending school,
depriving them of that salary when they fail to do the homework, etc?
Not for not doing the homework; homework should be for
learning, not grading. But for failing to learn the
material, and the material for a course should not be
decided by the students. They are to learn what they
do not know, and this is often what they do not know
even exists.
--
This address is for information only. I do not claim that these views
are those of the Statistics Department or of Purdue University.
Herman Rubin, Department of Statistics, Purdue University
***@stat.purdue.edu Phone: (765)494-6054 FAX: (765)494-0558