The US is not failing at teacher preparation.
Submitted to the San Francisco Chronicle, July 11, 2013
Contrary to claims made by a group of California superintendents ("U.S. failing at teacher prep," July 10), the US
is not failing at teacher preparation. Quite the contrary.
When we control for the effects of poverty, American
students rank near the top of the world on international tests. Also, graduates
of American schools go on to perform impressively in the real world: According to the 2013 Global Innovation
Index, which is based partly on new patents and the publication of scientific and technical journal articles, the US economy ranks 5th in
the world out of 142. It is hard to conclude from these results that we have a
problem in teacher education or teacher quality.
The conclusions in "U.S. failing in teacher prep" are based
on a report that only considered factors such as admissions standards and
course offerings. As Susan Ohanian has pointed out, this is like judging
restaurants on the basis of their menus.
Stephen Krashen
Original article: http://www.sfchronicle.com/opinion/openforum/article/U-S-failing-to-adequately-prepare-teachers-4656045.php
Sources:
Control for
poverty: Payne, K. and Biddle, B. 1999. Poor school funding, child poverty, and
mathematics achievement. Educational Researcher 28 (6): 4-13; Carnoy, M and
Rothstein, R. 2013, What Do International
Tests Really Show Us about U.S. Student Performance. Washington DC:
Economic Policy Institute. 2012. http://www.epi.org/).
Thanks Stephen for responding to that article. I saw it in the paper when I was stuck at the SF airport two days ago. I brought it home with me to respond to it, but you've done a great job at that. Are those Broad superintendents?
ReplyDeleteJack, please respond. Send it a letter. Newspapers will publish letters presenting a certain point of view if they get lots of letters presenting that view. Your letter will raise the chances of something getting published.
ReplyDeleteAnd you ask a terrific question - are these Broad superintendents? Let's find out.
All were connected to NCTQ. Google their names and NCTQ.
ReplyDelete