Senate Bill: Atlasian Education Modernization Act (Rejected)

[TJ in Oregon]

date=1373484942]

No quantifiable data, just anecdotes here. What percentage of bad teachers are kept on the job because of their union, Scott? Actually, I'd like to know what this bill defines as a 'bad teacher', because nowhere does it define what are the grounds by which a principal may fire a teacher, it just gives a principal the right to terminate a teacher without regard to due process. You mention an evaluation procedure, but why should teachers not have a say in how they are evaluated? Surely a teacher-created or even co-created evaluation process is far more fair than a process determined by some bean counter at the DoIA or a school principal.

This is the mentality that leads to a stagnant and underperforming system. If you are performing significantly below the expectations of your boss in any field, you should be able to be fired. That's how the world works. People are employed to accomplish things, not to build their self-esteem. Being fired is not incarceration; it is not being charged with a crime. If folks believe they have been wrongfully terminated, there are lawsuits for that and thousands of such cases are brought forth every year. I don't see why teachers should be held to some other standard than the rest of the world.

TNF, I agree teachers have one of the most underpaying and thankless jobs around. I agree they should have the option to collectively bargain for better wages and benefits. However, I reject the notion that they are above performance or the notion that teachers should be deeply afraid of performance metrics. That's not to say standardized testing is all that great because it isn't. Performance should be based on a number of different criteria and one of them ultimately has to be the principal. Making employment decisions is part of an administration job and there's no real way around that. If the school doesn't trust its principals to make sound decisions, perhaps they should have hired different principals.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

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Local funding will never be able to address the disparities in education. This is why Atlasia is so far behind -- the federal government won't accept its responsibility to fund education.

And that is why we can and should supplement to the extent necessary to account for that disparity, but within the limits I outlined. Sorry for not being clear on that, there were a lot of points to respond to.  

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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Works_council

'Too much federal control' is kind of rich when you consider that my amendment basically turns control of the schools over to the teachers themselves. That's a lot more 'small government' than whatever it is being proposed elsewhere in this thread.

But you are dictating this structure onto the Regions and LEAs, when that should be up to their choice. What else would that be called save for exerting federal control? As the debate has proceeded to center around, there is a problem with teacher quality and your structure would only serve to make that problem worse. Hence the comparison to the Soviet Factory, an archetype for innefficiencies. Advocacy for the teachers is one thing, but remember they aren't slaving in a factory to produce iron so some fat cat can get rich, they are working to educate the next generation for the benefit of society. You go too far in the former and the plant closes, you got too far in the latter and kids get screwed.

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Why?

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Why?

Because as Napoleon said, every Region has a different character and has different problems facing them in education. Not to mention different economic mixes and different employment needs. Also every student learns differently, has different talents and different dreams. There are some disparities you can't level by Federal fiat. In terms of the education itself, there is no one uniform education that will work for everyone or allow them to best meet their needs. Technology provides enormous opportunities to specialize learning and best meet the invidualized needs of students. Experimentation will create diverse models, more effective teching techniques, better curriculum and and testing methods that have some purpose, so that more students can be reached in the classroom and more will be able to learn and break that cycle of poverty. It isn't just about money, money is important, but that is only part of an education reform forumula. At some point, as with all expenditures you have diminshing returns and therefore you have to get creative to keep reaching more students and keep uplifting more people. Otherwise you will always be leaving somebody behind.

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Sorry, but the Regions are far too prone to inactivity or mismanagement to trust with such a vital issue as the education of Atlasian children.

Will centralizing authority in Nyman, fix that problem? No, and you don't want to fix it. You want the Regions abolished if I am not mistaken, correct? The problem is the same as in real life. Nobody cares about elections for mayor, town council, water resources, utilities commissions, zoning boards, and Boards of Education, and instead focus on the top of the pyramind, even as the majority of decisions effecting their kids education, where they work, what they drink and how they are kept safe are being made by those local officials. Monied interests can sweep in and buy these low turnout races at the local level and then people turn upward and farther away to seek redress. Sooner or later though the money creeps up and guess who is going to have more power in the halls of congress, the machine shop worker or the man with a billion dollars in a brief case. At least you can walk to city hall and waive sign. Doing that at the Federal level is much harder. We have to change the culture and move towards one that is locally focused. If 100% of Wake County voters turned out in 2009, instead of 11%, do you think the GOP would have won and then been able to abolish the county's decades old integration policy? 15% turned out in 2011 and that produced a 1 seat Democratic majority. The left is missing the ball big time, here.

That is why the leftwing model of centralizing authority is misguided, especially in a large country such as this. I love some of the things they do in North Dakota and Alaska, many of which would be considered Socialist if appraised honestly. I wish all the states would look to some of their examples. I would most certainly prefer that if we must have more government, that it occur as close to the citizens as possible because then it is much easier to organize resistance at the local level then 1,000 miles away. If people focused at the bottom of the pyramid and understood that is where the important decisions are being made and concerned themselves at the local level, they could exert far more influence over policy centered at the local level then with it centralized by the Feds.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

56:03 has been adopted.

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Sponsor Feedback: Hostile
Status: A vote is now open on the above amendment, please vote Aye, Nay or Abstain.

[Napoleon]

Nay

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

NAY

[Bleach Blonde Bad Built Butch Bodies for Biden]

Nay.

[TNF]

Aye.

I would like to withdraw Amendment 56:05 and Amendment 56:07 in favor of a revised version of Amendment 56:05, with text as follows:

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[Gass3268]

Nay

I could support this if this line was removed "Prohibit the use of tuition fees by private schools."

[Sbane]

Nay

[HagridOfTheDeep]

Nay

More comments to come. Don't know how I missed this thread, but wow. It's a doozy.

[Napoleon]

I will go ahead and object to TNF's new amendment in that case

[MaxQue]

Nay

[TJ in Oregon]

Nay

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Vote on Amendment 55:04 by TNF:

Aye (1): TNF
Nay (: Gass3268, HagridoftheDeep, MaxQue, Napoleon, NC Yankee, sbane, Scott and TJ in Cleve
Abstain (0):

Didn't Vote (1): Kalwejt

Amendment 56:04 has been rejected.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

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Sponsor Feedback: Hostile
Status: Rejected

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Sponsor Feedback: Friendly
Status: Withdrawn

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Sponsor Feedback: Hostile
Status: Withdrawn

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

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Sponsor Feedback: Hostile
Status: A vote is now open on the above on the above amendment, please vote Aye, Nay or Abstain.

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Sponsor Feedback: Origination
Status: Objection entered by Senator Napoleon, Vote compending completion of prior amendment

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Sponsor Feedback: Unknown
Status: Objection filed by Napoleon, vote pending completion of prior amendments.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

NAY

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

As I said we should allow for enough flexibility so as to allow for experimentation and the creation of alternative models could potentially help special needs kids, children with learning disabilities as well as the general student population learn more effectively, and and rigidly imposing a structure from Nyman, will make that impossible. Therefore I urge the Senators to vote against Amendment 56:06.

[MaxQue]

Nay. It's poorly written and there is bad ideas there. There is good ones, but there is bad ones.
I don't think it's our job to say how long recess and stydy halls must be long.

And honestly, I never got 2 hours for the total of both these things.

And "All schools [...]shall be required to be open [...] for no less than thirteen years." is clearly is misphrased mess. I suppose than kids should attend at least 13 years, but that's not what is is saying, it's saying than schools must be open during at least 13 years, which is more than wierd. And 5+13 gives 18, which is way too long. At 18, you should have been able to leave high school and entered a trades school or a vocationnal college, which is the appropriate track for some people.

The intentions are good, the result, not so much.

[TNF]

Aye.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

I could possibly go for tying a properly worded 180 day requirement to federal funding, with a mechanism for an exception to be granted to a particular LEA or Region provided they can prove that a model under that number can yield greater benefit to the students in the quality and/or content of the education being received.

[TNF]

I could possibly go for tying a properly worded 180 day requirement to federal funding, with a mechanism for an exception to be granted to a particular LEA or Region provided they can prove that a model under that number can yield greater benefit to the students in the quality and/or content of the education being received.

 Would that require me to withdraw this amendment and offer another one?

[Sbane]

Nay on the amendment as offered. I could support something like what Yankee mentioned.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

I could possibly go for tying a properly worded 180 day requirement to federal funding, with a mechanism for an exception to be granted to a particular LEA or Region provided they can prove that a model under that number can yield greater benefit to the students in the quality and/or content of the education being received.

 Would that require me to withdraw this amendment and offer another one?

Amendments cannot be withdrawn once they have been put to a vote.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

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How does this look?