Bill Gates Goes to School

Not to sure about Bennet as Sec. of Ed. but aside from that Bill Gates is a true visionary and I applaud his investment in the youth. Granted there is tons of blame to go around as to why kids do not perform well but the reality is "times are a changing" and what use to work doesn't anymore. Since so many youth today need alternatives why not offer as many new tools as possible? Unfortunately there is more to learning than the 3 R's. I agree that teachers should not be parenting but at least they need to be understanding of the lack thereof that many of these kids are faced with daily. Don't blame the youth for the situation he/she was born into. There are many obstacles educators are faced with today and I applaud those that dare to take on all the challenges to make a difference in a kid's life. Education needs to a priority in this country and until we can support the education system we all will suffer as a result.

Don't know where to begin. I disagree with your underlying theme that its the teachers unions that the ones in the way of better education and reform. Merit pay in theory and practice is ridiculous. The reason suburbans perform better than rural and city kids is because, more often than not, they have at least one parent with a post high-school degree. Studies show that having a parent with a college degree increases a child's chance of attending college increase exponentially. Its no secret why Gates schools succeed. One is class size, the panacea for the education system. Second is student selection. Gates gets to choose which students he wants. It is usually the best students to begin with. And Its usually the ones who have high parent involvement. A key factor in student success. Lastly, is funding. His schools are usually the best equipped and better paid, making the attraction of better teachers more likely. It is without question the US education system needs to be blown up and redone in a big way. Starting with this nonsense about summer vacation. The purpose of summer vacation has long passed. The next major hurdle is funding or more importantly how schools are funded. Across the nation most schools rely on property tax as it's sole source of funding. It may have worked for little house on the prairie, but in this day and age its simply undoable. Next, stop blaming the teachers unions, and start working with them. This notion that teachers are against accountability is insane. What teachers are against are being held to the whims of the board, the principals and or the parents. If you fail a kid, believe me, that parent can make a teachers life a living hell if it weren't for the union. Hell, coaches can't even cut kids from teams in some districts because of the PTA, no matter how unprepared that kid is to play that sport. Are there some bad teachers out there, absolutely. Just like there are bad cops, doctors, lawyers, congressman, carpenters and plumbers. The idea that the unions only exist to protect these bad actors is insane. By and large teachers spend more time at there profession than there contracts and pay require. They spend there own money on items that should be funded by the school, like printing ink and paper, pencils for gods sake, and other materials. Dumping on teachers will not solve our education crisis. Lastly, we much change the culture of learning in our society. We have an entire political party devoted to playing liberal elites against the everyday people. The derision this party shows for the educated is barely hidden. Education is the silver bullet for poverty, crime, and many other social ills. We need to move away from obtainment and begin to glorify achievement.

I use the phone all the time, yet I would not dare apply for a job as the head of AT&T! I had a baby, but I don't think that qualifies me to be an obstetrician.
Why do people assume that anyone who once attended a school can run a school district or be Secretary of Ed?

Just like NCLB they will get a bunch of suits together that have never taught in an actual classroom, and decide what is best for American students. 100% by 2014, yea right, show me a company that retains 100% of its work force.

Love Bill Gates. He should be President!

Go to a KIPP school and you will understand what is possible. My son currently attends one where the majority of students are of African American decent and most come from below poverty families. I was told that he tested at a 1st grade reading level and just this year alone has already advanced to 5th. The days are long, they start at 7:15am and don???t get out until 5:00. Add to that a minimum of 2 hours of homework each night and you would expect a child that is burned out. On the contrary I have a child that is not only excited to go to school but can answer the age old question "what did you learn today?" with enthusiasm. He already talks of his college path, if this can be done with poor African American students in a school where the funding is relatively the same why can???t it be done on a national level?

Teaching is hard work with insufficient compensation. Society and politicians heap cheap lip service to the idea that our children are a precious resource. Funding of schools on local taxes results in inequality for poorer towns, cities and states. There are many multi-layered problems in our educational system and no simple answers.
Unlike business, teachers cannot reject students who are "not up to code", to use a manufacturing term. Societal issues are brought into the school and educators have to deal with children who are at risk and living lives that children should not have to bear. The hierarchy of school administration is remarkably inefficient, deaf to requests for help and support and cash strapped. There are students whose emotional lives are in shambles and unfortunately, educators have to take into account the student's social and emotional conditions since these will have an impact on the ability to learn. Until our society truly values and supports its must vulnerable members and is willing to step up monetarily, the most vulnerable will continue to suffer.
I applaud Gate's intentions since I know the public school system is broken. But I tire of the blame game. Since everyone has the common experience of going to school, everyone has an opinion. It is popular to blame the unions for many of the woes of education but unions are the only safe voice many teachers have. School districts are not supportive of personnel departments where concerns can be dealt with. Even as I write this, I wonder who will find some error, some fault with my writing or spelling and smugly point to it as an example of the low quality of teachers in this country. Walk a mile in my shoes and then come and judge me, but please, don't be so quick to find fault unless you understand the whole picture.

I have a postcard depicting the first public classroom in California--there are wooden desks, one chalkboard and an American flag. Yes, that room looks untenable for our students of today, but the curriculum was such that the students learned to read and write, do math, and read and write in Latin! Teachers today are called to fix all of the social ills of our cities. Gang problems, a class of 10 or more different language backgrounds, and more and more test and measures to qualify a teacher for moving up one level of a credential until you earn a professional clear. I wonder how the average person would handle the inner city classroom of today! Teachers can--the rest of society is what is wanting.

We do know what works -- smaller classes. No one wants to pay for that, however.

Most of the rest creates lots of time consuming paperwork that takes away from your work in the classroom, but makes officials feel like they're cracking down and getting tough. I say this as a former administrator who developed assessment plans.

Bill Gates does have some good ideas to offer regarding education reforms. But these are only ideas. We cannot use a business model with regards to our children. We have children who come from very dysfunctional siuations and environments. As an educator, I deal with this every day. Are also social workers, counselors, surrogate parents, etc. It is hard enough that in many parts of the country, classrooms do not have resources to deal with many problems we must face, Plus, how do we really measure how effective is a teacher in a classroom> Who will decide?

Bill Gates has outsourced more jobs than anyone in the entire country. Frankly if I were 18 I would say he's a
primary reason not to bother earning any degree.

Now that he's made his billions on the backs of foreigners he pretends to be a solid US citizen. Did he even try to locate any US programmers over the last 2 decades? The hell with him and his over priced second rate OS. And the same for H1-Billary Clinton.

Stop bashing unions, and stop passing teachers off as lazy and unccoperative. Teachers work in the trenches - they know what works and what doesn't. Has Gates - or Jonathan Alter, for that matter - talked to real teachers lately, or just the PR ones administrators trot out because they know the approved "party line" will be parroted? Teachers - unions or no unions - can still be fired for insubordination, and that includes refusing to follow failed policies or talking negatively about them to journalists. Bill Gates will have more problems with state policy makers district supervisors than he will with unions - and has he decided what he'll do with book publishers and the enormous power they wield over content and method? Blaming unions and teachers is easy. What about the people with the real power? Let's see him take them on.

It is simply hard to understand how giving money to companies or tax cuts to the wealthy will ever help our economy. When you think about how our economy actually works it becomes apparent that businesses succeed and grow and the wealthy gain more wealth simply because people spend, because the general population has and spends money and thereby stimulates the entire economy, allows business to grow and even provides profits for the wealthy. Just giving money directly to those at the top, whether businesses or the wealthy, has clearly proven to do little for the over all economy or for the majority of Americans. The objective that makes more sense is to get more money into the hands of the average person who can then participate to spend and stimulate the total economy. Saving businesses, which have proven to be irresponsibly and poorly run, by injecting tax payers??? money, may have some short term effect but it is simply asking to have to throw more money at it again later. And giving tax breaks to the wealthy tends to only make the wealthy wealthier. If the desire is sincerely to stimulate the entire economy, to benefit everyone, then the goal needs to be to make the average American more secure, free from exploitation by greed / dishonesty, and with more spendable income and just more confident that their status will remain stable. Any rationalizations that say otherwise, for instance the ???trickle down??? theory, are fraudulent and offer only deceptive solutions that benefit just the few. Our economy is more of a ???bubble up??? function and what is needed now is more stable consumer spending with higher employment, better security and without giving tax dollars to those at the top while just hoping somehow they will do something to make benefit then ???trickle down???. Anything our government does now should be focused on accomplishing that and on rejecting any rationalizations to justify otherwise, which are focused on benefiting the few. They have clearly and repeatedly shown us exactly what doesn???t work and to continue to do the same things, expecting different results, is totally stupid. Voters need to recognize and reject those who advocate / rationalize continuing with more of the same thinking. When the focus is on the wealthy, only the wealthy get real benefit; when the focus is truly on the average American, everyone wins!