NYC Educator: Boost Panorama Survey Results, or Teach Children?

NYC Educator: Boost Panorama Survey Results, or Teach Children?

Boost Panorama Survey Results, or Teach Children?

That's a choice we're facing, and I'll tell you why.

Yesterday I parodied the Panorama Survey, as I've been doing every time they put out a new one. I understand that it's important we treat students with respect, but I'm not at all sure that's what this survey measures. There are a whole lot of questions about whether the teacher is doing an adequate job, and there are a whole lot of reasons why the responses may not be accurate.

Here's one. I taught summers and evenings at the English Language Institute at Queens College for about 20 years. I came to college teaching from high school teaching, and thus my methods were a little different than those of colleagues with different experiences. I'd often hear laments from them about poor behavior in classes.

I never had any such complaints. Once, we had a very young student who was immature and problematic. I called his parents and had no more issues. My colleagues were shocked. The general behavior of my college students was such that I could accomplish much more. I could go over material in half the time I was used to. If there were behavioral problems, I stopped them instantly. I was used to far worse.

We were rated by the students, and that was quite a big deal for the program. After all, they wanted to increase business, being a non-credit, optional program. One semester I got a bad rating. This was a big issue. I determined to never have that happen again, and the secret sauce for that was not at all difficult to uncover. I stopped bugging students to do the homework. I stopped bothering people over poor test scores. Sure, I got less homework, and lower test scores, and sure some students CONTINUE READING: NYC Educator: Boost Panorama Survey Results, or Teach Children?