Will Firing 5-10% of Teachers Make Us Finland?

[Modern School]

The 5-10% Solution, was written by Matthew di Carlo, and originally published on the Shanker Blog, and then reposted on Valerie Strass' The Answer Sheet.


In the world of education policy, the following assertion has become ubiquitous: If we just fire the bottom 5-10 percent of teachers, our test scores will be at the level of the highest-performing nations, such as Finland. Michelle Rhee likes to make this claim. So does Bill Gates.

The source and sole support for this claim is a calculation by economist Eric Hanushek, which he sketches out roughly in a chapter of the edited volume Creating a New Teaching Profession (published by the Urban Institute). The chapter is called “Teacher Deselection” (“deselection” is a polite way of saying “firing”)

To read the rest, please visit http://modeducation.blogspot.com/2010/12/will-firing-5-10-of-teachers-make-us.html

[msongs]

1. Finland is a totally different culture/society than ours - NOT comparable because to

get the same outcome u have to have the same situation. Finland is not ethnically diverse and probably much less class, language, religion, cultural divisions than the USA.

[xchrom]

3. But Finland admits to using lessons from

Our best years of public education and has something like
90%(?) unionized teachers.

If they're so different - why use the U.S. As an example?

[Ozymanithrax]

2. No but it will contribute to child originated ignorance... n/t

[Starry Messenger]

4. Hanushek is a Hoover Institute Senior Fellow.

http://edpro.stanford.edu/hanushek/content.asp?ContentId=61

I hate that their conservative tripe isn't called out every time it appears. He's not just an "economist", he's a "right wing" economist.

[mike_c]

5. I think the goal is laudable, but the means are laughable....

First the goal-- Finland is a VERY egalitarian society with minimal class division, at least compared to the U.S. Finnish people value the role of education in their lives, and have a tradition of "folk schools" that permit a wide range of continuing education, including "breaks" from high school for service learning and other educational diversions. As has been pointed out previously, Finnish teachers are broadly organized and enjoy both union protections and a very strong professional culture. Achieving even HALF the degree of social enlightenment that supports education in Finland would be a wonderful thing in the U.S.

But the proposed means-- firing the least well performing teachers-- is ludicrous. Create a similar culture and more professionals will gravitate toward education in America, and less qualified individuals will perceive the profession as less of a refuge. Trying to create the outcomes without recreating the broader culture that supports education in Northern Europe is just doomed to failure.