Teachers overpaid

[Dixiejack]

I posted several replies about teachers' pay and tests from a post secondary perspective.  Did you bother to read them? Can't you guys get over the fact that teachers feel they are underpaid and those who don't teach, think that teachers are overpaid.  There are several professions that merit the same argument--plumbers, mechanics, doctors, commercial pilots and airplane mechanics (union through and through).  Preachers--way overpaid for the hours put in in return for what they get. How would you feel about paying all of the above (except preachers) minimum wage to provide the services you depend your lives on.  Quote "you want first class oats, you pay what they are worth. Now if you want oats at a cheaper price, run them through the mule."

[kevinsmith5]

The "nationwide" standards IOU folks keep discussing are known as Common Core Standards and have been adopted by quite a few states in the past several years.
As for how other unions will react to the behavior of Chicago union members, as someone who is not and never has been a member of a union I can't say for certain.

[reliquary]

On the subject of minimum competency and basic achievements:  Those are the purposes for which the state tests were designed.  In Texas, I went through three different systems of them.  My main experience was with the TAKS version, which is being replaced with individual end-of-course tests, supposedly course-specific.  (I retired as those were being published).
 
As stated in the original design of the TAKS test:  "It is expected that not all students will pass these tests.  Those who do not pass will receive a Certificate of Completion rather than a Diploma."
 
No minimum standards for the districts were established at first.  Then, when large numbers of students failed the TAKS and didn't "graduate", the state established a system of ratings that evolved into a system of competition among individual districts: Unacceptable, Acceptable, Commended, Exemplary.  These were based on the percentages of students who passed the tests.  Then that devolved into a system that could be manipulated by the districts: a low percentage on this thing could be offset by a high percentage on that thing...one of my favorites was that the system could get a higher rating if it had higher numbers of students taking the ACT; to get there, the principal simply mandated that all students had to take the ACT and the district paid for the costs.  Therefore, our ratings went up.
 
The sytem could also be manipulated by putting students in SpEd...they didn't have to take the State tests at first. Later, they were required to TAKE, but not to PASS the tests.  I'm not sure what the requirements were.
 
Later, the standards were raised for the percentages in each rating category, because "too many students are not achieving minimum competency".  So the schools manipulated the sytem again, putting students in categories that required special conditions for taking the tests, including individual administration of the tests by a teacher or aide.  I suspect, but can't prove that a lot of improper testing was done behind closed doors:
 
the child of the School Board President, given individual administration of the test by an aide who was a friend of the family, who passed the State test...
 
the child of a teacher in the school, given administration the test by his his-aunt-the-aide, who passed the State test...
 
etc, etc.
 
It was at this point that I gave up and retired.