Scientist to Teacher in Record Time!

This is the caption on a new local billboard, clearly trying to lure capable technical people into the struggling teaching field. It’s advertising an accelerated program that will cut down the obstacles usually put in place to keep people from getting a state teaching certificate. Also, presumably, this advertising is funded by the US local or state Department of Education with the idea it will solve the problem of not enough capable people willing to teach science and math in the public schools.

This sounds like a wonderful solution—we’ll just invite scientist to come in and they’ll take care of things. But will it work? There are some definite problems with the idea. As usual, it’s a program planned by bureaucrats without much idea of conditions in the classroom, or why scientists don’t seem to have much interest in working as public school teachers.

First, there’s quite a difference in pay between scientific or technical occupations and teaching. A grant for this program funds part time work that pays a pittance during the qualifying period. True, the current high rate of unemployment means there might be a body of unemployed engineers, mathematicians and scientists out there, so maybe some of them will take the offer. Then what?

Scientists and mathematicians are generally task-oriented, rather than people-oriented. This means they have plenty of skills at solving technical problems, but they don’t necessarily have people skills, especially the kind they’ll need in the classroom. There are schools where the students are attentive and well-behaved, with a good background and a real interest in getting a good education, but it’s unlikely there’s a teaching position open at that school. The teaching jobs that are hard to fill are those where students are poorly behaved, failing, often absent, suffering from psychological, emotional or learning disabilities and hostile to anyone suggesting they should work harder so they can graduate. All these problems are expected to be handled by the teacher. It’s not a school administrator’s job to deal with it.

Besides these problems, there’s increasing pressure on teachers to improve student test scores. In order to “improve” teacher qualifications for this, state Departments of Education have imposed onerous requirements, set up bonus programs and resorted to micromanaging what the teachers present. In some cases, teachers are expected to read from an approved script so that all students receive the same approved instruction.

So, what the program is offering is a low paid, difficult job that's supposed to be what? Rewarding because the teacher gets to work with children? A better solution for the lack of science and math teachers is to realize that the demands on teachers are unrealistic, and to improve teaching conditions. A local physics teacher recently quit in the second week of school. “I don’t have to put up with this,” she said. She packed her things and left the students sitting there.

Reversing the Income Flow

It wasn’t that much of a concern to ordinary people some thirty years ago when President Reagan cut taxes on the rich and made his speeches on TV about how “Supply Side Economics” would benefit everybody. After all, ordinary people have other concerns, like dealing with their own household budgets. But now the results are in. We’ve gotten to a position where ordinary people can feel the effects.

Just installing a structural bias in government policy apparently wasn’t enough, and recent greed has exposed the process of how the rich have been looting the US tax funds. Not only were billions of dollars unaccounted for in the Iraq War, but billions went to a small group of companies that caused a world-wide economic crisis and then cried to be bailed-out.

We failed to pay attention to history, or at least to insist that it not be repeated. The recent near-depression isn’t the first crash tied to “trickle-down" economics. Economist John Kenneth Galbraith attributed the Panic of 1896 to the same kind of economic policies. So we didn’t pay attention, and now there is rampant unemployment, “Occupy Wall Street” protests in the streets and a “Poverty Tour” making the rounds. These are calls to reverse the income flow which has carried all that money to the top 10%, and more specifically to the top 1% of the wealthiest in the US.

Proposals for raising taxes on the wealthy have provoked complaints about socialism and “forcibly seizing” wealth from the rich to give to the poor. The truth is that going too far in either the direction of unregulated capitalism or stagnating socialism is bad for the country—we need the middle road. However, the excesses of the last thirty years need to be undone. We need to raise taxes on the wealthy, and institute polices that use the taxpayer’s money for neglected infrastructure and research and development. We need policies that regulate companies that make sure they behave responsibly and don’t take all the profit while transferring all the costs of their business to the taxpayers.

This has all been proposed, but so far it’s been blocked. That means we need to look at breaking the hold that the rich have on our politics. Campaign reform, anyone?

If Math Scores Are Rising, Why Do We Need to Import High Tech Workers?

In the last few years, US schools and teachers are under increasing pressure to raise scores in reading, writing and math. Supposedly this focus on test scores is to make the US high school graduates more competitive in the world jobs marketplace. So, is it working?

Studies show that US test scores are rising, and unemployment is rampant. High tech manufacturing firms are complaining about not having qualified applicants and requesting to hire from overseas. US high school graduates with good math scores are working as cashiers at Walmart. Hmmm, maybe there’s something wrong with the education plan.

Well, there are a couple of things going on. First and foremost, it’s cheaper to hire from overseas. There are logistical problems to moving manufacturing plants to say, Asia, where the labor is cheap, so the latest trend is for companies to build their plant in the US--but then they have to deal with the high cost of labor. This problem can easily be overcome by importing labor that is willing to work for lower wages. Immigrants are willing to bear the high cost of specific technical education in order to hold a job in the US, where monetary exchange rates make their wages seem high.

And next, there’s currently little opportunity for US students with good test scores or even a college degree to find experience or specific technical education to qualify them for the available job openings. Those technical job postings are specific, asking for things like experience with a particular software release, and with the clear expectation that the new employee can start work right now at a high rate of productivity and with no on-the-job training. By insisting on these qualifications, companies ensure that their job openings remain open.

What’s wrong with the education plan is that it isn’t comprehensive enough--it doesn't provide the opportunities. A national focus on reading, writing and math doesn’t do any good unless there is a means to get talented students into the available job positions. Solutions? Tax or other incentives for companies to hire, and if necessary, train US graduates for their job openings. Technical schools that develop relationships with companies to train workers for specific needs. Opportunity for US graduates. Really, without the expectation of good jobs, why should kids bother with all that homework? Social media is much more fun.

Twilight: How Does a Story Shape Reality?

You have to have noticed The Twilight Saga, regardless of whether you’re a fan. It’s been a phenomenon, with the four books topping best seller lists and the first two movies making over a billion dollars in revenue. Because of the global economy, it isn’t unusual for stories that speak to a large number of people to sell like this in world-wide release. If the story elements resonate, then books and films are embraced by millions of people. However, because of the huge response to stories like this, it becomes important to look at how they affect the structure of our reality.

There are two kinds of reality perceptible to the average person, that is: a personal consciousness and what is popularly called the collective consciousness. Everyone is aware of their own personal consciousness, what they think and feel and the sum of their experiences. However, the collective consciousness is something that comes to us by way of human society. It includes the shared beliefs and attitudes that unify a cultural group. There’s also a cultural “unconsciousness” proposed by Carl Jung, which is an inherited grasp of archetypes that allow us to decode and absorb cultural information.

In other words, elements from the collective culture infiltrate and inform the personal consciousness when they’re attached to archetypes. Twilight is built with archetypes: the innocent maiden, the handsome hero who saves her, the challenge of another suitor and the maiden’s choice. Besides this storyline, the suitors both offer a possible danger to the woman. The first is a vampire: the beautiful but cold creature whose soul is in jeopardy, and who wants to suck out her lifeblood. The second is the werewolf, the fevered man-animal barely under control who could kill in a second of anger.

That’s the structure of the story, but then what are the cultural elements that are attached and transferred along with it? Protagonist Bella moves to live with her father and go to high school in a small town in the American Northwest. After meeting the irresistible vampire Edward, she lies to friends and family about what she’s doing and where she’s going; she abandons her other friends; she allows Edward to spend the night in her bedroom without her father’s knowledge. After Edward tries to leave her, she engages in risky behaviors to hurt herself in order to convince him to pay attention to her. Edward and his family are rich, drive fast, sporty cars and live in a local mansion. Bella refuses to believe that Edward loves her as she is. She wants to be a vampire, too, so she can be beautiful and strong and perfect, so Edward will love her, and she pursues this goal throughout the story.

There’s no doubt that author Stephanie Myers has her finger on the pulse of young women. Because of the success of this story, it’s clear that it resonates with this segment of the population. However, Bella is a poor role model to serve for the cultural consciousness. She’s treating others badly and looking for a quick fix to her insecurities: the magical vampire’s bite that can make her immediately perfect. Where’s the part about Bella accepting herself, following the rules and setting goals for personal improvement? Where’s the part where she becomes strong and successful through her own hard work? Where is the part about responsibility? That might be better cultural information to pass along.