Teacher Retention

A recent article in the Charlotte Observer (the newspaper for Charlotte, NC) noted that they are having a teacher shortage in high schools. It appears that some of the schools were not meeting the standards set by the No Child Left Behind Law. A judge then demanded that the scores go up.

Charlotte, pictured to the right, in their infinite wisdom, took that to mean getting rid of bad teachers, hire better teachers, and then the quality of the education would then be reflective of the better teachers. However, this method backfired. Dozens of bad teachers were fired, which is amazing in itself. Where's the ACLU when you need them to stand up for mediocrity or failure? Anyway, since many teachers were fired, this decreased morale within the school system, causing good teachers to quit. Now the school system cannot hire enough teachers to fill the vacancies left open by the quitters.

Now, if this had happened in Baltimore, the outcome would have been different. If a judge had demanded that the test scores increase, former Baltimore Mayor and Socialist advocate, Martin O'Malley, would have returned to the judge 20 minutes later showing that the test scores were now higher and that graduation rates were up, too.

How is this possible? The solution is simple. Once you redo the grading scale, someone who previously was failing is now getting a C or D. Someone who was average is now getting A's and B's. The students are not anything differently. They didn't need to retake any tests. (For God's sake, he only had 20 minutes!) And the wonderful thing about this method is that it can be applied retroactively. So 19 year old kids who thought they failed the 7th grade again suddenly find themselves in the 8th grade with their peers.

And since we're making up grades, let's enhance our graduation rates. Now Baltimore, pictured to the right, shows graduation rates near 70%. That's kind of funny when you look at the classrooms and see 11 seniors in it. Did only 12 seniors start their freshman year in this class? Of course not. Prairie Dog O'Malley just changed the graduation calculation to say, "How many kids started their senior year divided by how many graduated." This is a clear bastardization of the calculation method used by everyone in the industrialized world, but O'Malley wanted to be Maryland's first Socialist governor, so he had to do something and he had to do it fast. He wasn't going to allow some educated Republican to see the poop through the forest. Official graduation rates for Baltimore City, as calculated by organizations outside of the Socialist State of Maryland, are closer 24%.

So, Charlotte, NC, what can your town learn from this? Stop trying to do the right thing for the children and obeying the law and start doing what will make you look good in the short-term so that your politicians can bask in their glory and wisdom. It worked for O'Malley, it can work for you!