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Institutionalization of mediocrity?

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[cross-posted at LeaderTalk]

One of the reasons I like the Eduwonk blog so

much is that Andy Rotherham doesn’t pull any punches. I may not always agree

with what he says, but he dares to speak his mind. For example, in a recent post he

says that K-12 education

‘is a culture that accepts and institutionalizes

[teacher] mediocrity’

and that there is a

chronic lack of emphasis on effectiveness and

performance at every step along a teacher’s value chain from preparation,

recruitment, hiring, induction, mentoring and support, and professional

development to evaluation and compensation.’

He goes on to say that

‘talented people don’t want to work in places that aren’t talent sensitive

and this creates an adverse selection problem that reinforces these problems.

[Also,] current practices make this even worse in practice … and credentialing

rules, which often have little connection to research, further limit the pool of

would be or could be teachers.’

Andy’s original

post is here

and includes some interesting links to other sources. What do you

think of Andy’s comments? Is he off-base or right on the money?

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