My blogroll at left includes the blog for the National Association of Manufacturers (ShopFloor.org), a page I visit several times a week. As a former manufacturing manager and projects manager in three small Silicon Valley companies, I'm interested in manufacturing as a field and welcome the views expressed on that blog.
When they write about education, my ears perk up. Two of my three career choices, together in one blog! When they write about John Stossel and his recent issues regarding education, I'm even more interested. They did so recently, and one sentence really caught my eye:
And yes, we know there are plenty of dedicated teachers out there who are quite competent, thank you. But as the biggest end users of the products they crank out, manufacturers have a special concern for the quality of teachers. (boldface mine--Darren)Manufacturers are the biggest end users of students? I wouldn't have guessed that, as much as we hear about the erosion of our manufacturing base, the outsourcing of jobs, and the primacy of the information economy. Did they make a mistake here, or do they know something that isn't being reported at all?
Either way, they agree with Stossel--go find out why.
7 comments:
I understand what you're saying. When I was a manufacturing manager, I had complete control over my raw materials. If they didn't meet my standards, I could send them back to my supplier. As teachers, we don't get to send back our raw materials (students).
However, we can't always blame faulty product on raw materials. Sometimes, it's *our* process, not the vendor's process, that's causing the problems. A company concerned about its reputation for quality will research the issue and come up with an honest solution, not reflexively fault vendors.
We teachers need to be honest enough to recognize that our profession, and those who speak for it, are creating part of the problem. And we need to address what we're doing. We can't change the parents, and neither should we try. But we do need to ensure that our own house is in order, and that it's not made of glass if we're going to throw stones.
Only then will people take us seriously, and grant to us the respect that we think we deserve but are denied.
"I can not fire the person I am trying to train"...there are plenty of people in fields other than teaching who have to deal with factors beyond their full control. A salesman can't excuse his failure to make his quota by arguing that the potential customers in his region are too dumb to understand the advantages of his product. An airline pilot has to deal with weather and with equipment problems, even though he didn't create the bad weather and (usually) didn't break the piece of equipment that failed.
I do think teachers should have much more power to get rid of disruptive students. However, I haven't heard of any mainstream teacher's organizations lobbying for this. In general, they seem more interested in evading than in seeking responsibility and the power that goes with it.
David's final point is, in my opinion, the primary reason why teachers are *not* held in high esteem.
Our profession certainly shares *part* of the responsibility for teaching children--isn't it sad that that has to be said at all, and that some might debate it? George is also right that parents and students share that responsibility with us.
The problem comes when we teachers want to point fingers at those other two and insist that only when they clean up their act will we clean up ours. Life doesn't work that way.
Also: manufacturing executives don't typically by any means have total control over their resources. They are dependent on the sales organization for demand forecasts, and often feel that sales does not take this responsibility seriously enough. Usually, they use computer systems provided by an IT organization which is not within their control, and these systems often suck. An engineering organization designs the products, and they often do it without giving proper consideration to issues of manufacturability. And so on. Yet the manufacturing exec is still responsible for making his numbers, including quality, cost, and volume goals.
Teachers have a hard job, but they need to understand that lack of total control is not unique to them.
"Since respect like energy can't be created or destroyed only changed in form"
Respect, like economics, is not a zero sum game.
It looks like I accidentally hit "delete" instead of "accept" on a comment here. I had no intention of doing so, and I apologize for not posting your comment. Please feel free to post again, and I'll endeavor to be more careful with where I aim the mouse.
"It looks like I accidentally hit "delete" instead of "accept" on a comment here. I had no intention of doing so, and I apologize for not posting your comment. Please feel free to post again, and I'll endeavor to be more careful with where I aim the mouse."
The rat ate it!
I'm hearing that from a teacher! :)
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