The End of the Road for PUBLIC SCHOOL Teachers? I Don’t Think So!
Is it the end of the road for public school teachers? It seems like a bad sign when a respected teacher wins an award for teaching, and during a conversation afterwards on CNN, tells young people to go into teaching only if they enter the private sector.
Last week Main teacher Nancie Atwell became the first winner of the Varkey Foundation’s Global Teacher Prize. Atwell is a veteran teacher, and a specialist in literacy at the school she founded, the Center for Teaching and Learning, in Edgecomb, Maine. Nancie has helped many students who come from diverse backgrounds. She has also written books about reading. One, I found, has a Forward by the late great Donald Graves (National Writing Project). This impresses me to no end. See HERE for more about Nancie Atwell.
The concern, however, is that in Nancie’s reply to the CNN anchors when asked, “What do you say to kids who are growing up that may want to consider teaching?” She answered, “Honestly, right now I would encourage them to look in the private sector.”
She didn’t say do not go into teaching. She essentially said don’t teach in public schools.
When asked why, she answered “Because public school teachers are so constrained right now by the Common Core standards and the tests that are developed to monitor what teachers are doing with them. It is a movement that has turned teachers into technicians, not reflective practitioners. And if you are a creative, smart young person I don’t think this is the time to go into teaching unless an independent school would suit you.”
She makes valid points. In fact, if I’d been Nancie, I would have added more about what makes it difficult to be a public school teacher today.
***Teaching in public schools doesn’t need to be so difficult. See below for how I think teaching could be made better, and you are welcome to add to this list.
I would also kindly remind Nancie, since she mentioned Common Core, that due to the alignment of the ACT and the SAT to the Common Core State Standards, even her school (all schools) will have to face the standards. If private and independent schools, like hers, want their future students to be accepted in most The End of the Road for PUBLIC SCHOOL Teachers? I Don’t Think So!: