TheLeviathan

Repeating that made up 75% number only undermines what you say you want to accomplish.

Well, some of what you're saying is just flat wrong. When we compare countries we compare apples and oranges. Our country's diversity makes the comparison flawed from the start. Almost no one in Finland shows up hungry or without a home. Most of the challenges people perceive are part of our education system are actually socio-economic. Research has shown strong correlation between home socio-economics and educational success. Our public schools can certainly improve, but comparing us to some white bread European country overlooks all the challenges that education has to oversee in this country that others don't deal with. So, sure, by some half baked tests you can say that. By every other measure of the way our children go out and affect the world? We're still kicking ass and taking names. As for the rest of this misguided rant, I've worked in education for 5 years. 80-90% of my colleagues are amazing educators. Your rant feeds the very issues that drive down teacher pay. Why increase the pay of people who are 75% crappy at their job? Everytime someone like you repeats nonsense like that it makes it harder to reward good teachers. (Which the majority are, we don't sacrifice so much so we can be bad at our jobs. God knows the pay and benefits don't keep us here) I've been outspoken about how I think unions have gone astray on all fronts, but your post is drivel. And it's factually inaccurate to boot.

I disagree quite strongly. That false narrative is a huge part of what has led to DeVos getting as far as she has.

The lengths you're going to in order to not share what you are referring to tells me you don't believe your interpretation will hold once you reveal it. If you don't even have that much confidence in your interpretation, I'm not sure why anyone should give it any credence.

Save the trouble, just give us a paragraph where he asserts what you are suggesting. Or give us the page number. Otherwise, it feels like you're Trumpifying your argument here.

This is a guy I'll be making a concerted effort to track this year. I hope this investment really pays off.

Well, sourcing your reference would be helpful. That's not spoon feeding, that's just providing context.

I have great admiration for special education teachers and also pity. Even in my five years I've seen their role change from working with kids with learning challenges to basically policing out of control behaviors. I've thought about that role because of my own history working with special needs children, but the BS they are put through would force me out of education for sure. Also, as an aside, my wife does the same work. She is a BCBA with autistic children. She also loves it, plus she's far better compensated than if she took her considerable skills into a school building.

It's deflating. This profession is such a punching bag, mostly from the right. But I've heard parents of all persuasions that think they can do the job better. Worse yet, I get paid squat for the work I do and the benefits have gotten progressively worse over the five years I've been doing this. I get a lot of appreciation and love every year from my students and their parents, that helps, but it doesn't help my own family. It doesn't pay the bills. And I keep hearing how we're doing a crappy job while more and more is piled on our plate. While parents do less and less to support our efforts. While the government works to make our job harder. And now this doofus is in charge. I hate hearing about charter schools and the BS they pass off as success. My classroom takes any and all, not hand selects kids that will make them look good. I'm tired of seeing black and brown children forgotten, ignored, and deliberately shunted away from the one thing that could change their lives all so that some well off white person doesn't have their kid's school scuttled with diversity. Or, god help us, their money might get dispersed a little bit to help some children. I watch kids in homogenuous countries with different rules about special education getting propped up as "better" than American kids. Even while our kids do more at younger ages than ever before. And continue to lead the world in innovation, creativity, and so many other things. I'm tired of a test being used to determine if a 9 year old should get to advance with his/her class. I'm tired of schools being punished financially because, on one day, their students weren't up to standard. I could go on, but I'm deflated. I'll always work hard for the 30ish kids in my charge for a year, but it gets harder and harder not to look elsewhere. You know, a job where I could take a sick day when I'm sick without adding 4 hours of work to my plate. A job where I'm paid a livable wage. A job where my benefits and perks aren't constantly being rolled back. But I am fighting back, Jeff Flake (my state senator now, here in the pit that is Arizona. Or as I call it "Arid Mississippi") has heard from me numerous times. I plan to do more as I learn more about this place, but it's hard to generate a lot of enthusiasm to fight when the hill seems so steep. Maybe DeVos will get some people on our side again. I mean, I'd love to make every American try for a week what I do. I imagine teacher salaries would triple by the end of it once people realize what it entails. Now I'm rambling....

And I'm hoping we can get her fired so we can impose some better ideas on the Dept. of Ed than the mess she's bound to create.

She went into a thriving urban DC school and basically called the teachers lazy and waiting to be told what to do.

I might have to update daily what this maniac is doing too.

He rabble rouses the base while the puppet masters go about their work.....

I guess I'm confused what you find those differences to be as you first allude. I think there is one type you could argue (dealing with identity issues - LGBTQ issues for example) that I would agree about, but are there others?

Well, I can agree with all of that. But now you are arguing against what they want to impose and why, as opposed to condemning them for the act of imposing. Which is different than telling them they are wrong for imposing. We all do that, it's hypocrisy to fault them for that.

Equate? The only thing I've equated is our desire to impose on one another. Which is true, we all do that. There is no moral high ground to be had there, no matter how hard you want it. And you're being hypocritical if you deny it. Your claim is inherently problematic. While some views (depending on the moral issue) may contain degrees of objective reasoning those come in degrees and that brush is painting far too broadly. And that's to say nothing of how complicated the relationship is between values and facts.

I would suggest characterizing non-religious moral beliefs vs. religious moral beliefs as a battle of fact vs. non-fact is more than a bit problematic.

Exactly, which is why we vote for those that share our values. We want the authority to "allocate" them. Which, whether people want to accept it or not, is an imposition on those that disagree with us. We might dull those through compromise or mutual interests, but our motivations are no different. They are the same as those who are driven by religion to try and "allocate" their values in the same way. We just have different sources for our moral philosophies.

I would agree Brock, that is one kind of imposition that is religious in nature. And this is another way to say what I'm saying, thank you. It's interesting to me how several posters so aggressively rejected they take part in this. Part of buying into the ol' social contract is the acceptance that you will impose and be imposed upon as part of signing up.

Sorry, for me this was a pleasant distraction while I sit on the couch with a sleeping baby.

All value systems have the potential to lead to moral or immoral conclusions and even religious people use non-religious arguments on their side. They certainly do about abortion, for example. (Billboards everywhere attest to that) I doubt that changes your belief. I feel like the problem is you're trying to hold moral high ground where there is none to hold. For anyone. I would suggest you try and just accept the fact that you do try to impose on other people. It doesn't make you a bad person, it's just how it is. The key is to win the other side over for why your imposition makes us all better off.

I was clumsily speaking as a right wing religious person when I said "your whatever agenda". I should've made that more clear, my apologies. Just as I said to Chi, on a personal level I might agree with you about religion and laws. But the reality is that the vast majority of our citizens have their moral values informed by religion. Getting into a contest about whose morality has better grounding is opening a several century old philosophical battle that has no definitive conclusion.

So now you're arguing values built on religious faith aren't worth entertaining at all. That has it's own host of issues. (I may even agree with it on a personal level, but that's one big ass can of worms)

That's precisely my point. You can impose all sorts of things that aren't religious. You started by criticizing religious people for always imposing their beliefs on others. My point is...it's not just religious people that do that. So do you. So do I. So do all of us. Asking them to stop doing that is hypocritical and unfair. Just as when they demand you stop pushing your whatever agenda. We need to get away from that kind of flimsy criticism because we all do it. We need to change their minds, not tell them to stop doing the same thing we're doing.

Absolutely, we should all be aware of how we are trying to impose our views. It changes our approach, makes us sympathetic, helps us find common ground. All things sorely lacking on all sides these days. Hence why I found this aside important.