So are the Democrats who disagree with making a new crime related to test cheating by teachers.
They already have a punishment: it is called losing their job.
What’s next? Criminalize taking pens from the office? Or paper clips?
We can make everything a crime if we want, but then we bog down the judiciary. At some point we need to realize that sometimes the real world consequences are bad enough. Fire and blackball cheating teachers. No need to fill up already full jails.
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I agree!
I agree with you and have a simple solution — you cheat, you’re done! End of story. No second chances!
Then what? Another lifelong unemployed person?
I would think they’d still be able to move to another state to find a teaching job, right? Of course, there’s always open jobs at McDonalds, Wal-Mart, Home Depot, etc…
There’s a shovel ready for them somewhere.
“Well, the world needs ditch diggers, too!” – Judge Elihu Smails
Not to disagree with you Dave, but it’s our stellar students who’ll be taking the mcDonald’s jobs!
That statement assumes there is nobody else available to take the job.
Well, the cheating teachers or the brain-dead kids can compete to see who gets to work the drive thru! Sounds like a plan.
Well, why would you ever put them in a position to possibly do it again? If they become unemployed for cheating, then I think it’s a personal problem. We hold teachers to be sort of role models for our children. Is a cheater a role model you would want your kids or any other kids around? There was a teacher fired where I live for a form of cheating and she has lost her license. That doesn’t mean she can’t get a job doing something else. It just means she’s doesn’t have suitable enough character to be around children.
I agree as long as it can be proven that they were involved with the cheating and there is a way to give judical process to that. I don’t think the tax payers don’t want to give rewards to teachers who were fired without cause. Otherwise, it’s like calling someone a witch in the 1700′s.
From monty python. The inserts are mine.
“How do you know she’s a witch (cheating teacher)?” “She turned me into a newt (tad pole, not speaker of the house)(the kids passed the test)…… I got better. (hasn’t been proven)”
They could become school board members…
…or State Ethics Commission board member.
…or Insurance Commissioners.
Or Sec of State, wait they are overqualified [educated]…thanks Karen for ruining the job.
Who dares criticize the anointed one?
Not throwing people in jail for cheating on tests just encourages it! Haven’t you learned anything from the lengthy debate taking place over child prostitution?
They changed the test answers on a lark.
If the teachers are caught, and proven guilty through due-process, then keep them as an employee in the system. Ie; janitorial, or in the kitchen, and adjust their appropiately. That way when they quit, they would be ineligible for unemployment.
**Adjust their pay appropriately**
I challenge anyone to watch this video about the crazy Kathy Cox curriculum and than you will see why we have a cheating scandal!
Math Education: An Inconvenient Truth
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tr1qee-bTZI
Watching the video, I prefer the standard algorithms. I think the others are interesting in the fact it can teach that there is more than 1 way to solve a problem. I wanted to see an example of math 123, or maybe I did, and they didn’t call it that.
GOP
This is the new curriculum Kathy Cox uses and method of teaching. In fact the books are same in our elementary schools. It only changes as the kids advance but the style is the same. In Washington the parents won a lawsuit against the school for teaching math this way. The results were so bad 50% of the kids entering college need remedial math in Washington.
In high school and junior high it only goes further down hill by not even tracking to the standard university course work ie algarroba 1, geometry, algebra 2……
…Finally, using the parents in the state of Washington as an example, please inform your elected officials that the parents in GA do not want to spend the next 10 years in court fighting the GA DOE. Please review the article from the Seattle Times. Much like the “discovery” methods being pushed by Kathy Cox and her team at GA DOE, the Office of Public Education in Washington State has promoted and mandated the use of integrated/reform “discovery” math methods for at least 10 years and degraded the mathematics skills of students entering college. On Thursday, February 4th, the parents in Seattle experienced a big win….a King County Superior Court judge ordered the Seattle School Board to take another look at its decision to use the Discovering Series of texts for teaching mathematics. Judge Julie A. Spector called the decision to teach from the Discovering curriculum “arbitrary and “capricious.”……
http://blogs.ajc.com/get-schooled-blog/2010/02/15/parents-against-georgias-new-math-take-battle-to-public/
“What’s next? Criminalize taking pens from the office? Or paper clips?”
That’s called stealing. And it already is a crime.
Which means “Micro-Chip” would have wanted to make it a lesser crime than it already is. See Microchip Implants, 2009.
and the beauty is with the Governor’s “Pay for Performance” scam it will encourage more teachers to help “adjust” their students’ test scores so that they get to have a pay increase
I wish we could pay politicians for performance. We have some who’d be living below the poverty line.
…and some who should be paying us.
A law against cheating will be just another law on the books that doesn’t get enforced. And when some nitwit gets caught again, some politician will rant and rave that we need a tougher law. More laws aren’t the answer when existing laws are even enforced. As for cheating, or altering tests, permanent expulsion from the teaching profession and loss of pension eligibility is punishment enough.
I just want to ask though: If someone was cheating like this because it looked like the school was going to fail some bogus measurement criteria and therefore lose needed funding/resources, so they were doing it to try to help the students, is that still the appropriate punishment?
The terms “fire” or “firing” comes from the tradition of when a person was no longer wanted in a village, the rest of the villagers would burn down their house. Doing something unethical “for the kids” or because they were put in a bad situation is still wrong. They should have let the scores drop and expose a problem as opposed to cheat to get money for the kids. They should be fired if it can be proven they cheated….for whatever reason.
I’m not sure we need to burn down their house just because they cheated. That seems a bit harsh.
Democrats are soft on crime.
Agreed! They should be fired and not allowed to teach again. If teachers knew that firing was the penalty if they cheated, then perhaps it could be a deterrent to any teachers cheating in the future.
Y’all have watched too many John Wayne movies. The story doesn’t really end after he punches the bad guy and walks away. The “bad guy” eventually gets up and the town still has to deal with him somehow. And in our world, he may not really even be a “bad” guy, just someone who made a mistake.
Sorry, but I don’t see it that way. Most mistakes are accidental; cheating is full-blown intentional. There is intent with cheating. As for John Wayne, I grew up watching his movies. Even John Wayne would not condone an intentional act of cheating!
Lawmakers ought to be careful with that pension thing. Might give rise to the idea that the unethical be stripped of their state pensions too.
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