This is way off topic and may not pertain to high school teachers or college professors, but I thought it might be something to bring up even though it doesn't involve technology. Last night some friends and I were discussing the idea of requesting teachers and whether it was a good thing or a bad thing. For the most part schools do take request into consideration when placing students, but how far should schools go? Should one teacher get a whole class of requested students. Generally, from my past experiences, parents that request their students a teacher are parents that you get support from and the students have less behavior issues. The argument is that it is not fair for the other teachers if they get all the students in their class that have less supportive parents, this group would tend to have most of the lower students in it because it is believed that parents being involved with their students helps them grow. The case for the requests (my opinion) is that it is a reward for those teachers that take extra care in their students, strive to be the best and get a positive reputation, and over just go the extra mile to make teachers look professional. To many times I look around and see teachers mocking their students, talking about how much they dislike their job, or just acting like their job is not important. Teachers that work hard should get the benefits of having supportive parents in their class. If other teachers want to complain, which they do (at least in my case), they should work harder.
I know that this isn't a black and white area when it comes to teachers, but in my three years of experience I have seen this subject come up many times between teachers, administrators, and friends. What do you think?
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4 comments:
Well, at the college level you can just 'teacher shop' yourself instead of making the request. I think as often as "how good the teacher" is the motivation to request a teacher, it's also what has the student heard from their peers, can they be in class with a friend (or friends) and from which teacher does the student perceive the least work to grade ratio.
Hi Rick,
I agree with Kevin's comment at the college level. I have known students who went to www.ratemyprofessor.com (I think) to see who is "tough" and who is "easy". This falls into Kevin's work to grade ratio. At this level, it seems that the better, tougher teacher gets fewer students I am sad to say.
Also, if a person does not like their job then they should just leave, in my opinion. Teachers everywhere are given a bad rap when someone acts like that and its not fair to the rest of us.
Ken
As others have stated, we do the same in college but usually students pick the professor that is the easiest (or easiest path to an “A”). Students usually ask their peers or look on various websites that rate professors to see which is the best (and usually the easiest). Sometimes this works well and sometimes it does not. As the father of a K-12 student, I would like the idea of picking his teacher for the next year. I have heard great things about some of the teachers at his school and not so great things from others. Theoretically, it would be nice to have that choice, however, logistically I am not sure how it would work. It is a debatable topic, however, probably best left to how it is now.
High school teachers have to face ratemyteacher.com which I understand can also be ruthless (I've never been and don't want to!) I've heard stories of parents posting to the site. The behavior seems to be accepted, but I wonder what would happen if things worked the other way...teachers selecting students. I'm sure there would be utter outrage!
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