Pay-for-Performance Teacher Compensation: An Inside View of Denver's ProComp Plan
Phil Gonring, Paul Teske, and Brad JuppHarvard Education Press2007
Phil Gonring, Paul Teske, and Brad JuppHarvard Education Press2007
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution wants to know why people in positions of authority are keeping parents in the dark about the quality of their child's teacher, whom they will meet next week for the first time. "Many of those parents have no real idea of the teacher's capabilities," the editorial board explains.
In 2005, Demarcus Bolton learned that he was one of 20 Atlanta high-schoolers who would receive a $1,000 scholarship from City Councilman H. Lamar Willis's charitable foundation. Two years later, Bolton remains scholarship-less. After calling Willis's office repeatedly, he finally gave up. "I just let it go because I was tired of being lied to," he said.
It's tough to know what to make of them, those who cling to the idea that social engineering will cure the ailments of public education's sickest parts. John Edwards belongs in that camp.
As Gadfly recently noted , prospects for Congressional bi-partisanship for the renewal of NCLB are eroding. George Miller and Buck McKeon appear to hold very different views--this month, anyway--as to what's wrong, what's right, and what needs fixing, and how NCLB 2.0 should differ from the first iteration.
Call it double-time, academic style. In March, the Pennsylvania National Guard launched a three-week GED prep class, completed in basic training, for those who signed up to serve but didn't finish high school. The program isn't easy (students are in class nine hours a day, and rise at 4:45 a.m. for physical training) but seems to be working. Of the 120 enrolled so far, 85 have received GEDs.
We provoked a bit of a stir with last week's piece, featured in the Wall Street Journal and Gadfly, titled (by the Journal's editors) "Not By Geeks Alone." Most of that stir was intentional.