BACK SHE KOS POLITIKAKKE - Politics thread

by **mpmcgraw** » Mon Sep 08, 2008 17:35:12

VoxOrion wrote:*added that last bit so mcgraw could get a sense of what we were talking about.

I honestly didn't even know you guys were having a conversation when I made the first post.

by **pacino** » Mon Sep 08, 2008 17:42:55

VoxOrion wrote:
dajafi wrote:Maybe I'm overstating the trend because I agree with you, but it seems more and more that this is a majority view (as in, maybe 99 percent of people on the right, 55 percent of people on the left). If there weren't considerable sympathy for this view on the center-left, something like this--DC's attempt to kill job security guarantees in exchange for much higher teacher pay--wouldn't even be on the table.

I have seen the shift even in joe-not-interested-in-politics. A friend of mine lives in a town overrun with old people who vote against anything to do with the school just as a matter of obligation - so they created a resolution that said "say no if we can increase spending 15%" and won.

When I see those "Should we raise the budget... ask a child" billboards, I want to scream - I think that tactic is really losing fast.

In the end, call it jealousy or whatever - joe six pack doesn't like the idea that you can get raises and keep your job with no verifiable signs of progress (no, that's not a support of NCLB) - particularly in the world of dwindling labor unions.

As for more money and experimenting, I'm of two minds. Obviously some of the innovations have worked at least in isolation (charter schools, etc); obviously they haven't moved the dial at scale. I agree that the bulit-in inertia, of which teachers unions are a huge part, is a big reason why.

I'm just so tired of hearing that any government program or institution that fails would have worked if it just had more money. That's always the response, it's awful.

I also wish people would just relax with their irrational fear of "God" and give vouchers more play - I know, I know... INTELLECTUAL HERESY BURN THE NEANDERTHAL*!

*added that last bit so mcgraw could get a sense of what we were talking about.

Well sometimes more money does equal better service. And it's kind of silly to expect teachers to be 'judged' by any sort of standard other than peer review. Currently we look at failure rates of kids, test scores, etc. What do either have to do with TEACHERS, rather than kids or parents?

Finally, since when is mpmcgraw 'liberal'?

by **pacino** » Mon Sep 08, 2008 17:46:14

Werthless wrote:Sarcastically misrepresenting your opponents' positions usually reads quite lamely, IMO, even if there are "factoids" sprinkled in.

Except when Palin does it, then it's AWESOME.

by **dajafi** » Mon Sep 08, 2008 17:49:33

As someone who's been having this argument with other liberals for years, I can tell you that the question of HOW one evaluates teachers is the sticking point. If it's solely test scores, that leaves out too many other factors. If it's solely peer review, it likely becomes a protection racket, esp if the union is involved. So you need both, but the difficulty of that negotiation becomes an obstacle in its own right.

Still gotta try though.

by **pacino** » Mon Sep 08, 2008 17:55:09

I'm for 'merit pay', but there's no way to implement test scores as a basis for paying a teacher. That can lead to a lot of corruption of the learning process, IMO.

by **Phan In Phlorida** » Mon Sep 08, 2008 18:26:15

Take this for what it's worth, for whatever you want to take from it...

A friend and his wife up in NEPA took their two children out of Catholic school a couple of years ago because the tuition rose so high they couldn't afford it. After about a month in public school, they got a notice from the school that both kids would either have to go back one grade or take a whole lotta tutoring, classes, etc. in order to catch up to their peers. Turns out the Catholic school curriculum was about a grade year behind that of the public schools.

by **jeff2sf** » Mon Sep 08, 2008 18:28:29

pacino wrote:I'm for 'merit pay', but there's no way to implement test scores as a basis for paying a teacher. That can lead to a lot of corruption of the learning process, IMO.

But the "learning process" is already corrupted. Pacino, perfect is quite clearly going to be the enemy of the good here. Gotta try something and adjust from there rather than wait until we have it perfectly negotiated/planned out to satisfy the myriad of issues... sometime in 3008.

by **FTN** » Mon Sep 08, 2008 18:32:12

jerseyhoya wrote:
FTN wrote:538 this morning has it 303-234 and 50.0-47.5

298-240, 49.8-48.

Another couple days of McCain polling ahead, and I imagine 538 will have them back around 50/50.

Did McCain Really Get the Bigger Bounce?

Obviously with a headline like that, you're probably expecting me to go all counterintuitive on you, and to some extent you'd be right.

Going into the conventions, the race was trending to Barack Obama by roughly 1 point. At the height of his convention bounce early last week, Obama had moved into a 5-6 point lead, indicating a convention bounce of 4-5 points. Now, over the past weekend, the polling appears to have transitioned into a 2-3 point McCain lead, indicating movement of 7-8 points.

But the question is where are we measuring the McCain bounce from. If you measure it from the peak of the Obama bounce, then indeed McCain has swung the polls more. If, on the other hand, you're measuring it from the pre-convention baseline, McCain's bounce is arguably slightly less -- especially since Obama's bounce was probably blunted to some extent by the Sarah Palin selection.

This is all academic, I suppose, but the point is that while the Republicans had a reasonably successful convention, the Democrats did too. Once the dust settles, I think you're going to see some movement of evangelical voters further into the McCain category, and some movement of Clinton Democrats into the Obama category. I think we can say this because even polls conducted during the peak of Obama's bounce had McCain gaining ground among evangelicals, and even polls conducted this past weekend had Obama gaining ground among Clinton Dems. Where other groups of voters will settle, however, remains to be seen.

by **TenuredVulture** » Mon Sep 08, 2008 18:39:10

jeff2sf wrote:
pacino wrote:I'm for 'merit pay', but there's no way to implement test scores as a basis for paying a teacher. That can lead to a lot of corruption of the learning process, IMO.

But the "learning process" is already corrupted. Pacino, perfect is quite clearly going to be the enemy of the good here. Gotta try something and adjust from there rather than wait until we have it perfectly negotiated/planned out to satisfy the myriad of issues... sometime in 3008.

Pac is right. The problem with testing is it doesn't really measure a teacher's effectiveness. But we all can look back on our schooling, and we can probably name the good teachers, and probably most of our classmates would agree.

Of course, the other problem is the de-professionalization of teaching, where more and more teaching is like reading a script.

As far as vouchers--well, maybe in urban areas where there's more than two choices. But where I live, the only viable option a voucher would get me would be a "Christian" school where they learn cavemen walked with dinosaurs 6000 years ago.

by **jeff2sf** » Mon Sep 08, 2008 18:41:05

TenuredVulture wrote:
jeff2sf wrote:
pacino wrote:I'm for 'merit pay', but there's no way to implement test scores as a basis for paying a teacher. That can lead to a lot of corruption of the learning process, IMO.

But the "learning process" is already corrupted. Pacino, perfect is quite clearly going to be the enemy of the good here. Gotta try something and adjust from there rather than wait until we have it perfectly negotiated/planned out to satisfy the myriad of issues... sometime in 3008.

Pac is right. The problem with testing is it doesn't really measure a teacher's effectiveness. But we all can look back on our schooling, and we can probably name the good teachers, and probably most of our classmates would agree.

Of course, the other problem is the de-professionalization of teaching, where more and more teaching is like reading a script.

As far as vouchers--well, maybe in urban areas where there's more than two choices. But where I live, the only viable option a voucher would get me would be a "Christian" school where they learn cavemen walked with dinosaurs 6000 years ago.

What is he right about? That all you can use is peer review? If he's asserting that, he's wrong for the reasons dajafi pointed out. If he's saying that you can't just use test scores. No frickin duh.

by **TenuredVulture** » Mon Sep 08, 2008 18:41:48

jeff2sf wrote:
TenuredVulture wrote:
jeff2sf wrote:
pacino wrote:I'm for 'merit pay', but there's no way to implement test scores as a basis for paying a teacher. That can lead to a lot of corruption of the learning process, IMO.

But the "learning process" is already corrupted. Pacino, perfect is quite clearly going to be the enemy of the good here. Gotta try something and adjust from there rather than wait until we have it perfectly negotiated/planned out to satisfy the myriad of issues... sometime in 3008.

Pac is right. The problem with testing is it doesn't really measure a teacher's effectiveness. But we all can look back on our schooling, and we can probably name the good teachers, and probably most of our classmates would agree.

Of course, the other problem is the de-professionalization of teaching, where more and more teaching is like reading a script.

As far as vouchers--well, maybe in urban areas where there's more than two choices. But where I live, the only viable option a voucher would get me would be a "Christian" school where they learn cavemen walked with dinosaurs 6000 years ago.

What is he right about? That all you can use is peer review? If he's asserting that, he's wrong for the reasons dajafi pointed out. If he's saying that you can't just use test scores. No frickin duh.

No, that standard tests do not measure teacher performance.

by **FTN** » Mon Sep 08, 2008 18:43:35

and this of course comes back to the methods used to evaluate "intelligence". I have a fairly long rant on that that I'll save for another time*

* never

by **pacino** » Mon Sep 08, 2008 19:01:48

So what are the ways you want to test teacher performance, jeff?

by **FTN** » Mon Sep 08, 2008 19:04:05

I lolled

by **Laexile** » Mon Sep 08, 2008 20:26:25

FTN wrote:I lolled

It is very funny. Funnier still is that while they have "Voiced by Michael Weingartner" people in the comments think it's real. It isn't a very good McCain impersonation. The guy's been around for years. There must be people who can do a decent McCain out there. Still the guy does have great comic delivery. I'll take that over a quality impersonation any time.

by **VoxOrion** » Mon Sep 08, 2008 21:05:58

dajafi wrote:I'm not against vouchers per se any more than I am faith-based programs. Just want to see more to suggest that they work.

Do private schools have a higher failure rate than public schools? What if they're completely even? Why is that standard thrown out from the get-go? Isn't that the obvious first place to look for suggestions as to whether or not they work?

dajafi wrote:it's to punish public schools

I don't get this either. There's the obvious canard about the parents who are required to pay for public school whether they use it or not, but there's also the less obvious but probably more relevant fact that if you eliminated all of the private schools (for sake of study) what would public schools cost then?

The first is a canard in that there has to be some realization of shared resources - buses, bus stops, the fact that school taxes are spread out before and after you are done having school aged children in order to keep the costs managable etc, but the second is a real number that's quite relevant.

by **VoxOrion** » Mon Sep 08, 2008 21:15:34

pacino wrote:Well sometimes more money does equal better service.

I'm not talking about sometimes - it's always a complaint about money. Always. That's my problem. And, there's almost always a pattern of increased funding with no significant change in results, and the answer is still: more money and it would have worked/would be working.

pacino wrote:And it's kind of silly to expect teachers to be 'judged' by any sort of standard other than peer review. Currently we look at failure rates of kids, test scores, etc. What do either have to do with TEACHERS, rather than kids or parents?

Wouldn't we all love to have our cronies evaluate us? I know I would. There's no real separation of duty there, no risk management, no nothing. It's a system so prone to corruption it would be unthinkable in 90% of other professions, what makes teachers special?

As for the other hyperbole, all I can say is: Holy shit. Are you saying there is no correlation between the subject taught, the success of the students, and the quality of the teacher? I can't even debate that it's so outrageous.

Dumb kids, undisciplined kids (both socially and in terms of doing homework, preparing, studying, etc), I can get behind because I'm in agreement with in terms of contributing factors - but eliminating all responsibility from the teachers and acting as if that's not only rational but obvious? Can't drink that kool-aid, brother.

pacino wrote:Finally, since when is mpmcgraw 'liberal'?

When he's reciting claptrap? He's not mine to be embarassed by, caps or not it's a liberal argument he's making.

by **VoxOrion** » Mon Sep 08, 2008 21:16:58

pacino wrote:
Werthless wrote:Sarcastically misrepresenting your opponents' positions usually reads quite lamely, IMO, even if there are "factoids" sprinkled in.

Except when it's funny, then it's AWESOME.

by **dajafi** » Mon Sep 08, 2008 21:20:18

VoxOrion wrote:
pacino wrote:Finally, since when is mpmcgraw 'liberal'?

When he's reciting claptrap? He's not mine to be embarassed by, caps or not it's a liberal argument he's making.

I figured this out: he's actually the world's youngest Perot voter.

by **jerseyhoya** » Mon Sep 08, 2008 21:21:07

dajafi wrote:
VoxOrion wrote:
pacino wrote:Finally, since when is mpmcgraw 'liberal'?

When he's reciting claptrap? He's not mine to be embarassed by, caps or not it's a liberal argument he's making.

I figured this out: he's actually the world's youngest Perot voter.

Bahahaha. That's awesome.

Archived

BACK SHE KOS POLITIKAKKE - Politics thread

Added for Jerseyhoya: Who are you voting for?