First off, let me say this: I hate our current education system.
Why? Let thee count the ways, but I could start with the lack of accountability, lack of economic respect for teachers, rampant social promotion, shortcut teaching designed to 'teach the test' instead of teaching work and thinking skills, special-education classes that often are nothing more than glorified day-care settings, chronic drop-out rates with little attempt or energy in reclaiming these kids, etc. etc.
With these huge obstacles in the way of educational progress, it would be both shortsighted and naive to assume that we can 'fix' this system the way it is currently constructed. It would be like throwing a brick into the Mississippi to dam the river. Sure, if you had enough bricks and enough time and enough manpower and enough energy, you could do it, but those kind of resources don't exist in reality.
So you start from the very bottom, and work up.
First off, teachers. Too many teachers are now teaching with 'alternative certifications', meaning basically school districts are so strapped for bodies willing to teach that if you take a certification course - often you don't even have to have a college degree! - in a few months, presto, you're a teacher; here's your class. Good luck.
Small wonder the average teacher quits early -
half within 5 years, according to this washpost.com article. And really, what incentive do teachers have to stay? Sure, teachers
seem to be making more... but these arguments do not factor in working at home (tests, papers, etc) and all the additional duties effective teachers have to do to be successful.
In Europe, and in many Asian countries, teachers are considered on-par with scientists and other respected professions. Until the profession of K-12 teacher is elevated to this standard in pay, benefits, resources, and prestige, the system will continue to suffer.
But what if properly degreed teachers made what an engineer makes? Say, $60,000 - $70,000? I can already hear the catcalls. The districts would go bankrupt. The taxes would have to be raised. You couldn't find that many qualified teachers. This is true - at first.
Which is why you then eliminate the independent school districts.
The whole raison d'etre for ISDs was to provide an area for a school tax base and a localized entity to build and maintain schools, and provide localized school boards to deal with local education issues. This was a great idea - for the last century. ISDs in their current form are either generally overtaxed (many urban ISDs) or underfunded (many rural ISDs not lucky enough to be part of a large tax base company within their boundaries) So one answer to the funding and resource inequalities is to eliminate the ISDs and work with the education system on a state level.
Would it work? Well, you'd still have to have some sort of organizing body in smaller geographic areas, or keep the ISD school boards and make funding on a state level only. This would also allow closing underperforming schools and making some hard choices about where resources should go.
So in this improved school system, you have well-paid, qualified teachers, and state-level budgeting and funding. The next step is to eliminate social promotion. Yes, it was created so that underperforming students wouldn't feel socially defeated as they matured and grew up, but the reality is that especially in high school, more and more students are simply not ready for a curriculum that will keep our next generations on par with the rest of the technological world. In 50 years, our kids that we are sending through our current education system will be almost a generation behind these other countries, and if we lose that edge, there is no guarantee that we could ever catch up.
With the elimination of the ISDs then could come a nationalized, standardized curriculum, with several 'tracks' that could be followed: science, industrial, general, and honors, for example. The GED would not be eliminated, but would be bolstered with additional credits and a tougher GED exam. It's ludicrous under our current system that a student from California needs to know more about math to get the same degree than his counterpart from Alabama. Why this system has been allowed to continue for so long is probably the same reason America finds itself falling further and further behind the relay race that is the world order.
Would it be popular, Possibly, until people learned how much all this would cost - hundreds of billions a year for salaries, better school infrastructure, research, curriculum development, etc. But consider the alternative - what we have now.
And it's leading America into second-world status, one failed student at a time.
-SH
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