IMO, they don't need a degree in education. 90% of those classes are child psych and BS and have nothing to do with teaching. Have you checked out an education curriculum lately? It's bogus and has nothing at all to do with teaching chemistry in a classroom. Get a degree in chemistry and do teacher inservice like they do in education degree programs now. Done. Would you rather have a chemistry teacher minus the child psych class or a chemistry teacher minus the chemistry class?
If they all get professional degrees, they are not going to enter the grade school teaching profession, but into industry or higher academia. I can also tell you for a fact from up close experience that it is a rare professional scientist who also happens to be a good teacher. Teachers must have a serious specialty in which they must be expert and many of them need to better, there is no doubt. But requiring them to all get professional degrees and then teach only that profession is not only impractical, it is backwards. A science teacher's first priority is not to create good science, it is to train young scientists. Teaching skills are not automatic and teachers must be trained properly. If some of them are lacking in their expert field, then they should be required to get more education or get fired. Getting rid of the education curriculum is a misguided way of handling a situation that is more easily remedied by teachers meeting benchmarks in their expert fields.
I agree with Red. I know we're talking about schools here but my experience in Law School was interesting. The best Law profesors that had were those that had an academic background. They had Masters in Law and Phd's. Other profesors were lawyers that had their own practice and have terrific litigating skills, but as profesors, there was something that just wasn't right with the way they taught their classes.
One point here: You're acting as if all chemistry majors would enter into the teaching profession and since scientists are bad teachers, it would fail. Not all chemistry majors would end up teaching....only the ones who want to teach will teach. There are many bad teachers who have education degrees. Does that keep them from teaching? At least with a chemistry degree, they'd know the damned subject they are teaching. And for someone with a chemistry degree to teach, they would have teaching as a calling....because they have options other than teaching. A person with a education degree has no other option so schools take what they can get. And benchmarks are a much easier way to remedy bad teachers? What sort of benchmarks would a chemistry teacher without a chemistry degree have to meet to continue to teach school?
You're actually agreeing with me. They had a Masters in Law.....not a Masters in Education. What's happening in this country is akin to you having classes in law taught by a person who majored in Education with a focus in Kinesiology. Does that make sense? The best history, english and journalism teachers I ever had had degrees in their subject and loved those subjects with a passion. They didn't have a Masters in Education with a dream to be a vice-principal one day.
A science degree alone does not signify that one is a better science teacher. Even chemistry majors can forget their business and not keep up with current science, especially if their job is to teach, not create science. Teachers have certifications that they have to meet to keep their jobs and to receive promotions. Most go back to college and earn additional degrees. Calculus and Chemistry are the same courses, even if the students taking it are from the college of Education instead of Arts & Sciences. Okie can tell you more about high school certifications and benchmarks, I am quite sure.
Here's a couple of good columns on dissolving Colleges of Education. Dr. Williams is one of many teachers in favor of this course. http://www.townhall.com/columnists/WalterEWilliams/2004/03/10/educational_ineptitude http://www.townhall.com/columnists/WalterEWilliams/2004/05/19/educational_ineptitude_ii Oh and don't forget vouchers. While unions and politicians continue to screw around with their grand social experiment, we empower parents to get out of these failing schools and get their children educated. For people whose primary focus is supposed to be educating children, they'll stop at nothing to keep them from getting a proper education.
I don't understand quite frankly. This create science nonsense. Does a law professor create law. Does a mathematician create math? No, they know math and are qualified and deemed certified with a degree in it from an accredited university. This create science argument, IMO, is not holding up. I understand what you are trying to say but there is really no argument against having a teacher qualified to teach their chosen subject with a degree. The problem with certification is: who is certifying them? Is it a university certifying them with a degree in chemistry or is it the dept. of education with some nonsense certification? I'll take a degree please.
