Teacher shortage puts children’s future at risk
Editor’s note: The following is an edited version of a letter to the editor transmitted by the Associated Press that first ran in the Bolivar Commercial in Cleveland.
To the parents that can read this and infer some deeper meaning from what is being said, there is a good chance that somebody taught you this skill.
Our intention is not to slight or insult anyone. However, there is an educational crisis in our community that is real and it is putting all of our children’s future opportunities at risk. This threat is not the results of drugs, violence, gangs or weapons. To say that these things do not exist within all our schools as problem issues would be foolish.
However, the greatest danger for all children in public and private institutions is the absent of quality teachers; especially those that possess the skill set and the training to be effective in the classroom.
There are three important questions that I think need to be addressed that relates to this issue; what factors are causing this to happen, what can be done to reverse this and how is this impacting the growth and development of our children?
There are many individuals, who have the ability to be gifted teachers but they are deciding that teaching is a profession that has very few rewards. These rewards are not just monetary it goes much deeper than that.
There are some veteran teachers who are endowed with the talents for teaching that are warning others with the aptitude to stay away from teaching. I think this is occurring because in a great many of places teaching has become a politically hostile environment in which teachers don’t have the autonomy to really educate kids. They are forced to work in a test filled, punitive environment where teachers are more concerned with what a child can do before he enters the classroom rather than the skills he needs to learn. Some teachers feel that the culture of the school that they labor in does not place much value on the efforts they make in trying to serve children. They often feel they have no voice and this leads to fatigue and bewilderment. For in this high stake game of test scores, the nail that sticks up shall get hammered down. Along with this feeling of no gratitude, there are a great many teachers that feel debased by some administrators who only place value on children’s test scores and the feeling of grandiose those scores give them. Some of these administrators and instructional staff want positions of power but do not want the accountability of providing a supportive environment for teachers to grow in. As a result, teachers are under constant pressure to produce data that allow some of these administrators to promote their own agenda: themselves.
The children are suffering under the present situation and a solution must be sought by all.
Charles Brady
Cleveland
The Dispatch Editorial Board is made up of publisher Peter Imes, columnist Slim Smith, managing editor Zack Plair and senior newsroom staff.
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