Race To The Top

Van Roekel, head of the NEA said, about Obama, "He's recognizing that the very thing he cares most deeply about can't happen without the involvement and collaboration of those people who are teaching,"

Maybe I am just stupid but I don't get it. I don't see where there was any consultation with teachers about how that Race To The Top money should be spent. Well, no one asked and I know no one will read this but I am saying it anyway.

1. 100% of the money, not the 50% the feds want or the 68% the state will give, should go directly to the schools. McGraw Hill and other testing companies have made enough money already. We don't need anymore administrators or consultants with no educational experience telling us what do do. We don't need any more ARIS' around. We have data and parent notifications up the kazoo.

2. We need smaller classes. "Teachers," Obama said in Ohio last Wednesday, "are the single most important ingredient in the education system." A good teacher, no matter how good, will have difficulty reaching kids when there are more than 30 in a room. Kids that are behind need individual instruction, something the Race To The Top did not take into consideration.

3. We need better working environments. Kids cannot learn in sweltering classrooms. Obama and company use air conditioners when it is brutally hot, yet kids and teachers are expected to brave the heat. We need classrooms with roofs that don't leak and floors that don't sag. We need places for teachers and students to work together. We need paper and ink and copy machines. We need books that are teacher tested.

4. We need curriculums, particularly in the high school, that will train students for careers. We need to recognize that everyone is not meant to go on to college and we need money to help find the individuals strengths and interests so these things can be nourished and developed.

5. The one thing we need that money can't buy is respect. Teachers have educations equal in years to those of lawyers and other professionals yet our opinions and our suggestions are ignored. Our value is based not on what we do in a classroom but on some meaningless number on a sheet of paper.

I know I am rambling, but I am pissed, my specialty. Right now, I am seeing money, my hard earned tax dollars, under the guise of improved education, being thrown away. As I read today's Newsday article on the way the moneys will be spent, I wanted to cry. Nothing in education will change. The kids left behind are still going to be behind. The only difference is a whole lot of federal money is now involved and Duncan and Obama can act like they did something.

Hope the link to the article works: New 'Race to the Top' funds to help poorer schools