There is a new superintendent holding office in the 4th largest city in the United States.
Terry B.
Grier, ED.
D.
, was appointed the new Superintendent of Houston Independent Schools in September of 2009.
Since then, he has already taken action and has new implementations that he intends on initiating.
He has a past record of accomplishments with previous school districts, and apparently Houston feels as though he is the right individual to tackle many of the growing issues that this district is facing.
There is no doubt about his abilities if his accomplishments are valid, it is the fact that his presence could very well cause the unemployment of 400 teachers with the Houston Independent School District.
MY THOUGHTS: A.
If there are teachers who are not performing well, and all other attempts to train them, mentor them, assist them, and any technique to improve them is exhausted, then this may be something to consider, especially if they are just too inadequate to perform the job of teaching students on an academic level.
Teachers are supposed to better their students, not hinder them.
B.
It should also be pointed out that it is not only the responsibility of the teacher, parental and guardian participation is mandatory.
Students must be surrounded by individuals that see education as an important tool.
Parents must continue academic efforts as at home also.
Too many parents are relying solely on the teacher, when their laziness or lack of concern and effort is not contributing to their education.
Teachers cannot go home with their students to follow up on the progress while outside of the classroom.
Here again everyone wants to play the blame game instead of taking responsibility for their actions and contributions.
C.
This policy is most threatening to minorities.
Let's be honest, most low performing schools are in low income areas, where the majority of residents are of African American and Hispanic descent.
Hundreds of these schools do not have the financial resources to create learning centers, technology centers, advanced tutoring, and rigorous after school programs.
Even if these advantages are available, the community and the people who live in the area are not even able to afford to place their child in the programs without some type of financial assistance.
So then I ask myself, is it really about the students or is it about the money.
Usually money is always involved somewhere.
The reason is said to be because students are performing quite low on standardized tests.
But, the truth of the matter is that students perform lowly because teachers are required to spend a lot of time preparing for the test, instead of learning the fundamentals of the materials that they need to know that will be on the test.
This is why so many of our students are placed in remedial courses once the enter college because they have not adequately understood and retained the necessary information that they will need to be successful in their college courses.
It also has something to do with the parental involvement that I mentioned much earlier.
What the teachers do in the classroom also so desperately needs to be followed up and reinforced at home!!! There is so much time spent on Science and Math, until their Reading and English capabilities are limited, and it shows as they continue in the educational endeavors.
You will not believe the number of senior college students that cannot properly write an essay.
Science and Math are important, but there needs to be a little more focus on learning to retain, not learning to memorize.
In essence, a test is just what it is, a test.
It is impossible to totally grasp how much someone knows by using this method.
I do, however, believe that tests and assessments are beneficial because they yield a lot of informative data.
But sometimes, that data focuses on the wrong areas.
HOW IMPORTANT IS EDUCATION TO YOU? Words of Wisdom, Tracy Warren-White, BS Psychology