I recently read a study by the University of Missouri. The study is showing that low-income households tend to have less qualified teachers instructing the math classes for their children. The study, analyzing 8th grade math classes from around the world, found that students from wealthier backgrounds were more likely to be taught by better teachers. It found the teachers instructing wealthier children were more likely to be fully certified with a degree in math and have at least three years' teaching experience.
The study also found that the U.S. fares worse than almost all other countries included in the study when it comes to having quality teachers for lower-income children. The study showed that only 60 percent of U.S. students are taught by qualified teachers. When this is broken down into income brackets, the lower income families fared much worse. Sixty eight percent of wealthier students are taught by qualified teachers, while only 53 percent of lower income children were taught by qualified students. Only a little over than half of the lower income students are being taught by qualified students. These means about half of the lower income students are being taught by teachers who are not qualified to teach this subject. These children are immediately placed in an extreme disadvantage! Not only are they affected for the time taught by those unqualified teachers, they are affected long after that. It highly increases their chances for being behind in all subsequent math classes to come. Their opportunity to learn is dramatically affected. This can affect their ability to succeed in school and their ability to move onto college.
I do not think it is fair to keep these children from learning. In some situations, the child is stuck in a failing school. This problem, while not solved, at least is quite visible to most people. The math teacher problem, is however, one that can hide quite easily. We need to give children from all economic backgrounds a chance at a good education.
Columbia District Paying Well for Certain Positions
Columbia is one of the wealthier schools districts in Missouri. We have pretty good schools here, and overall, I like the teachers we have. Sunday's Columbia Tribune published an article on the front page, Payroll Shows District Focus on Higher-Ups. The article tries to disclose the details on salaries paid in the Columbia Public School district. CPS has 30 teachers who have reached their highest salary on the 189 day pay plan. It rewards teachers for their experience and education level, which is capped at $66,478. However, there are 125 administrators, media specialists, counselors and career center instructors who make much more than that.
The district is facing a $10.35 million deficit this coming year and there will be budget cuts. They have yet to decide on where these budget cuts will take place. They will need to cut $5 million from the operating budget.
Maybe they should be looking at the salaries of people! According to what they reported to the Tribune, there are 18 public school employees that make over $100,000 a year, including the $200,340 Phylis Chase makes as superintendent. She is currently making $77,000 more now than she was when she began her tenure in 2003. Chase previously worked for the Springfield Public Schools where there are only 10 employees making $100,00 or more, and they have 7,000 more students than Columbia does.
It would be one thing to pay these people this much if they had done dramatic improvements in our schools, but they have not! According to DESE, the differences between student achievement for white and African Americans is huge. Why does Chase's salary keep going up when the students are not doing any better? What are we rewarding these people for? We need to make sure our school district is accountable to the people and we need assurance they are financially efficient. What I am seeing here does not show this to me.
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