The Disadvantages to America's Education System

Educators have been singing the same song for many years they need more money, they are underpaid, and over worked. It is a popular belief in America that being an educator is a noble profession. To an extent this is true. Nobody ever questions the integrity of educators, but maybe its time that we do.

As a Para educator in a special education math class for junior and senior high school students, I was appalled to see the lack of accountability that was required of the instructor. Ideally the students would not fail the course because they had learning disabilities. At face value this seemed reasonable. However these learning disabilities were not disabilities at all. Instead there was an even more horrifying root to their special needs. For years these children had been failed by the education system. There were rare cases when a student legitimately had a learning disability. But the majority of the students suffered from years of being in classes run by teachers who essentially failed to teach. I observed 12^th grade students who had the reasoning skills to solve algebraic expressions once they were explained, however they did not know basic multiplication and division. Years and years of failure have compounded and the children are left to bear the burden, because there was no accountability to the educators. Once a teacher in California has completed a full year of instruction they become tenured. This makes it impossible to fire that teacher regardless of his or her performance.

Education has really turned into a business. It is all about numbers. In California each school receives an allowance per child who is in attendance until 12 noon. Now here are some facts that we need to look at. First your child is assigned a school geographically. So if you live in an area that is not very affluent, the allowance that the school receives is affected. So in short children who live in less affluent areas get less money for their education. That means that children who are poor start off at a disadvantage. No where in America do we hold teachers to a standard.

In Europe they are proactive in making sure that the education systems do not have a monopoly on their children's education. How? They place accountability on educators. Analyzing an educators performance is the key. Instead of allotting the school an allowance, the government allots the parents an allowance to use at any school they choose. The parent then is empowered to place a child in a school based on performance and not geography. To make sure there is a level playing field every student is worth the same allowance. This means that schools and educators alike have to work very hard to attract the amount of students needed to keep a school running.

We are lucky to live in a country that provides free education for all . That is one of the primary reasons that we are such a prosperous country. However our education system is getting away with robbing our children of their education and not being held responsible for it.