By JESSE SCACCIA
Over the last couple of years there has been great alarm about what’s known as “colony collapse disorder,” a mysterious malady that has been killing off bees by the millions.
A lot of people–myself including–are kind of terrified by this. It’s easy to think, “Bees are just one of a zillion insects out there? So what if they die out?” But the world is more inter-connected than that. Bees are our major pollinator. Without them, any number of our crops, plants, and flowers would fail. EVERYONE should care if there is a silent bee holocaust happening in our fields.
I feel the same way about what’s happening in teaching.
According to this article in The New York Times, Over the next four years, more than a third of the nation’s 3.2 million teachers could retire. Just wait. It gets worse.The article goes on:
The problem is aggravated by high attrition among rookie teachers, with one of every three new teachers leaving the profession within five years, a loss of talent that costs school districts millions in recruiting and training expenses…
So just what is so wrong with the classroom environment that our teachers are dropping like bees? What is the source of the teacher colony collapse disorder?
I’d like to get to the bottom of this. I’m starting with an interview with the president of the organization who commissioned the study the article is based on. His name is Tom Carroll, and his organization is called the National Commission on Teaching and America’s Future. Look for it next week. But until then, what do you think the problem is? How will we stop teacher colony collapse disorder?
I believe the bulk of the problem lies in the institution of education – too big for its own good; unbending in structure; bogged down by tradition, rules, and bureaucracy. I am an admitted constructivist at heart, so I am especially sensitive to issues of rigidity. The things that are being taught to new teachers – authentic assessment, ethic of care, student choice, multiple learning styles – do not match up with what they find to be reality in the system. They are unable to practice what they believe. This leads to frustration, which leads to attrition. Only an overhaul of the institution will keep it from collapse…or maybe it needs to collapse so people with my mindset can rebuild it…
I am not sure on a macro scale what the problem is, but my own has to do entirely with bureaucracy and technicalities. I have a CA single-subject teaching credential in English (good until 2012 and then renewable) and have taught high school for seven years. These days, I am considered a veteran. I applied to teach in Las Vegas before I moved here, a district famous for being hard-up for teachers. I was rejected because I earned my credential from an “alternative” credentialing program in CA, and the Clark County School District would not recognize my credential coursework. But I have a valid credential. And seven years experience. And CCSD started this school year with 25% long-term subs, who either have an emergency credential or none at all. This nonsense is the only reason I am not teaching in classroom right now
Why make it harder for teachers who want to be in the classroom?
Here’s my take…….
The men who got into teaching as a deferment from serving during the Vietnam War are now retiring in droves.
Deferments were first offered to married men, then that morphed to married men WITH children or a pregnant wife and deferments included men who entered the teaching profession.
I’d also bet that the average wage paid teachers began to increase as men who sought and received the deferments for teaching entered the profession.