I know a quite a few as well, Phil, and I despise most of them. I have to snicker a bit at the attempt made to declare as automatically heroic all members of an employee population that seems to be largely composed of driven mediocrities.
When I taught calculus and BASIC programming (mentioned in the other thread, so I'll not repeat it here), I had the respect of the department head and one or two of the other mathematics department staff - but I earned the ire of most of the others. They hated the fact that someone without a single phuqing credit in "education" was able to step in and take over and teach successfully - according to the department head and the students - an introductory course that none of them, despite years of additional service training and even advanced degrees in their field, was able to do.
They - and I mean other teachers in other departments - also resented the existence of the honors/AP program(s) because, in the words of one middle-aged English teacher, "you get the cream of the crop and we have to put up with the s*** that's left!" Now, does that sound like a "hero" to you? I realize that my experience was possibly an exception, but I still find it illuminating.
Yes, there are good teachers, and most of us have had the blessing of having been exposed to one or two in our lives. But they are the exception. Far too many are merely disgruntled time-servers waiting until the magic number of age and years of service allows them to retire.
The teachers themselves are not responsible - invoking the old Nuremberg defense, of following orders - for enslaving the minds directly, they are simply carrying out the instructions from a state-run educational bureaucracy that takes its cues largely from what ever is currently de rigueur in the current theory of education and instructional psychology.
Last edited by Ron G.; 04/08/08 05:14 PM. Reason: FUBAR #2
