Evolution Revolution Devolution

OK, I admit, the title of this post is dumb. Was just playin'

Anyway, a high school student who currently attends a public school, and who used to attend a private Christian school, asked the following (edited) question about evolution, and I answered as best as I could.

Here is the question...

"Well, I am in Biology this year...my exam in on Friday...and we have been studying the theory of evolution. While we were taking notes in class on evolution the verse from Ecclesiastes came into my head, where it says, "there is nothing new under the sun". Based on the verses before and after that verse I don't really think that it had anything to do with that, evolution I mean, but I was just wondering if it did. It was alot easier at (my fomer school) in science class because we were able to talk about these things from a biblical perspective, but being in a public school that is not how it is taught, or how the discussions go (though, really there are no discussions...it is just accepted as fact). So, I don't know. I get confused because some of it makes since...and then all of a sudden the teacher writes something that I am to copy down and I cannot see how anyone could believe it. So, there you go..."

Great question, don't you think?

And here is my answer...

"Dear ****,

You're right, the verse in Ecclesiastes has nothing to do with evolution, though it does speak to any and all ideas that come to man. Philosophically speaking, in terms of how people so quickly and easily jump from evolution to evolutionism, that is, from a scientific/historic theory of development to a purely materialist view of reality, then it's not new under the sun.

You're also right, in public school for the most part one cannot look at this or most other topics from a biblical perspective, or from a Buddhist perspective, or a Hindu perspective, or Scientology perspective, etc. It's a good thing and a bad thing.

I would venture to say that at most Christian schools they don't really look at the topic from all perspectives either (even if the discussion is more open) because they don't take evolution seriously enough to evaluate it and examine and respect it as the powerful model that it is. In my opinion one cannot speak with credibility to a matter if one does not understand it. I have found evolution too easily reduced to silly cliches by those who like it and those who don't.

Yes indeed, some of it makes sense. In fact, a lot of it makes sense. Not all of it makes sense to me or anyone else, but it is a powerful model or framework for understanding change - especially biological - over time.

We have to remember though that the processes that add up to evolutionary theory are strictly impersonal and with no purpose whatsoever. Evolutionary change is not progress; it is just change. There is no "point" to it. But, since we have a hard time swallowing that, we slip personal language into the process. We give the process "purpose."

On the other hand, and this is important, all scientific study has to have a kind of atheistic methodology. If you want to cure cancer, you find the mechanisms that cause it and you don't assume that the gaps of knowledge are to be filled in by God. We don't just say "God made cancer" and let it go at that.

In a similar way if we are curious about how so many of the plants and animals on an isolated island (like Madagascar) are so different, we don't just say "God made them that way," we try to understand how it is that they are or became different. There is nothing wrong with the impulse to want to understand that. That impulse is a significant part of what makes us human beings.

If you take both the Bible and science seriously, which you should, you will grapple with this issue most of your life one way or another. Just try to learn and understand as much as you can.

More later,

Mr. G."

I Don't Believe in the Trinity

No, not THAT Trinity silly (I certainly do believe in that one). I mean the unholy trinity, or perhaps better said, the unholy triumvirate that holds our public school hostage to mediocrity -- that is, the triumvirate of the teachers unions, the university programs that oversee teacher certification, and the legislature that keep reform from being possible.

I got to thinking about this while reading the Time Magazine cover story about Michelle Rhee, the federally appointed superintendent of the Washington DC schools.

I have heretofore figured that our public school system is beyond reform, irredeemable, and hopeless. Its mediocrity is felt worse in places that need excellence the most – in our inner cities and areas of socio-economic decline. Why we don’t offer the poorest people the opportunity to escape the system and attend charter, magnet, or private schools is beyond my understanding.

The sentence that most got my attention in the Time Magazine article was this:

“Rhee is convinced that the answer to the U.S.’s education disaster is talent, in the form of outstanding teachers and principals.”

I agree. Don’t misunderstand me. There are a lot of talented and superb teachers in the system, despite low pay, chronic discipline issues, and little regard or professional respect by the general public. As the saying goes, “Those who can, do, those who can’t do, teach, and those who can’t teach, teach others to teach."

It doesn’t help matters to have salaries printed every year in one of our local papers, as if to prove how overly paid our teachers are. This is just ridiculous. Putting it in perspective, the highest paid teacher in Guilford County has a Ph.D., thirty five years experience, and National Board certification, and she makes less money than my daughter will make coming out of PA school, and much less money than the average bright twenty five year old person makes coming out of a quality MBA program.

Michelle Rhee wants to make the teachers in Washington DC the highest paid teachers in the nation, and in the process get rid of the weakest teachers. I would like to see the same right here in Guilford County.

Until we offer financial incentives by way of higher starting salary and higher top salaries, teaching will continue to attract the less talented and less bright college students. We need to grease the wheels for lateral entry to enable talented people who have worked in other industries for 20 years not to have to take a 50 percent or more pay cut in order o be a teacher.

And we need a way to weed out the teachers who just don’t cut it, or who have quit caring. The problem in the current system is that whereas it is very hard work being a good teacher, it is all to easy to be a bad teacher. That is not an easy matter to fix because it is hard to objectify the evaluation process. Interestingly however, principles and fellow teachers tend to know who the poor teachers are. Unfortunately, the reality of local school politics makes it difficult to weed out the poorest teachers by subjective observation alone. Plus many of the best teachers are mavericks who aren’t terribly submissive, and who don’t always cooperate with the mountain of administrative work heaped upon them. And sometimes the best teachers are a threat to the worst teachers.

Somehow we have to find a formula that includes objective criteria (improvement in student competence), and subjective opinion, the views of principles, students, and even parents. I think I could come up with a workable system, but the union would never allow it.

Despite all the usual excuses for bad school performance, I believe that with well paid motivated teachers and principals we could turn things around and give the next generation a fighting chance. We don’t have to consign our poorest families to our poorest schools.

There are three things I would voluntarily pay higher taxes for - 1) hiring more policemen and firemen and EMS type workers, 2) maintaining our public spaces such as parks and greenways and such, and 3) paying our teachers more - a LOT more. I would gladly see my taxes DOUBLE for these purposes.

Let’s stop business a usual. As was said by someone in the recent campaign, let’s made education the Marshall Plan for the 21st century, or least for its first quarter century (the green revolution won’t happen unless we have enough people, taught and rained to carry it out).

Mr. Green, look to Michelle Rhee.

That’s where I’m coming from.

Joel Gillespie

Bad Rhino

I love the Rhino Times generally, but their annual educational salary listing always aggravates me.

One mistake was made regarding the highest paid teacher who is not a coach or AD. The article says:

"The highest paid teacher who is not an athletic director or ROTC instructor is Ann McCary, a teacher of exceptional preschool children, who is paid $72,000. There are 15 other teachers who make over $70,000 a year."

Actually, according to the listing itself, the highest paid teacher who is not an AD makes $73, 120. This teacher happens to be a good friend of mine. She has 35 years of educational experience, a doctorate, and National Board Certification. I personally think that it is a travesty that the highest paid teacher in a large county-wide district of this size (and with such qualifications) only makes $73, 000. That's a pity. What does that say about the rest of the teacher salaries.

I think is tacky for the Rhino Times to publish this list in the first place. Yes, it is public information, but publishing the list has a voyeuristic feel to it, and I can't see how it promotes anything good. It is well to remember also that these salaries are all set my strict salary schedules. You can find those schedules on the Guilford County Schools site. Check out the salaries at the lower end. That's the real story.

Just keep in mind what kind of salaries await college graduates in any number of other fields and you will understand why it is hard to attract and maintain quality teachers.

Mr. Hammer repeats the mantra about Christmas and Easter breaks, and about that two month period of time in the summer that teachers are supposedly more or less on vacation. Believe me, that two month break is a double edged sword. When I taught school I had to work every summer to make needs meet, and finding that work was always a challenge in itself. Mr. Hammer concedes that such a break may be worthwhile to mitigate against burn out. yeah, you think?

Few people who have not done classroom teaching have any idea how draining it is, and more and more with all the discipline issues and stupid stuff coming down from on high.

The article also says the following:

"Also missing from the list is last year's highest paid principal, Valerie Collins, who was at Brown Summit Middle School last year and working on her doctorate. She was making $140,000 last year and is not on the list this year. "

Well, there is a good reason that Ms. Collins is no longer on the list. She had a sudden heart attack this spring and died.

I had the pleasure of meeting Ms. Collins this year and seeing her navigate her way through a very tricky situation. She was a delightful person and a fair minded and conscientious administrator of a coveted program at Browns Summit Middle School (which my daughter will be attending in the fall).

I think that saying what was said about her was the height of bad taste. No doubt the Rhino didn't know. But, since the point of the story was the "new" people at the top of the list, one would think the reporter would have wondered what happened to those folks no longer there. I hope there will be a front page apology to the family.

Personal Note: I like the Rhino Times and agree with John Hammer on many more issues than not, and I think he is a great guy. I applaud his devotion to this city, and the great success of the Rhino Times which I read every week. Thus I hate getting on his case about this issue each year; but I wish he would stop doing this to our teachers.

The Real Axis of Evil

I was very glad to hear Obama talk about education, and especially about how our kids need education across a range of subject areas, and how we need to get away from teaching to tests.

This is all very good. I like it. But...

We got into No Child Left Behind in the first place because our public school system, broadly speaking, sucked. It was failing our kids. The fact is, it is an embarrassment. We should all be ashamed.

I am a strong believer in public education. I am a strong supporter of public school teachers. I was a public school teacher for five years. But our system of public instruction is broken beyond the ability of its traditional overseers being able to fix it. I think it is beyond reform.

There is an Stalin-esque alliance, an axis of evil, an unholy trinity that holds our public school system in a death grip. This alliance is made up of the state departments of pubic instruction, the university departments of education, and the various teacher's unions or associations.

There are good and well meaning people in each of these groups who care about our children, but the system as a system is guaranteed to look after its own interests and not that of our children or our families (or our teachers).

Throw in the federal government as in "No Child Left Behind," with it's earmarks and scoring systems, plus ladder climbing superintendents whose upward mobility depends on good scores and it all just gets worse.

Until this triumvirate is broken I see no hope for real or lasting or effective change. It will just be window dressing, moving the furniture around, sloganeering.

What OUGHT and what NEEDS to happen is that responsibility for education needs to pushed down as much as possible to the local level, even as we keep per pupil funding as even as we can. Education is simply one of those things in life that works best locally. It is, oddly, one of those things where, until local communities have to step up, they won't, and when they have to, or until they are no longer made irrelevant, they will step up.

We have to change the certification rules for teachers. Teacher certification classes mean little compared to a lot of other things that make for good teachers, like decent IQ's, knowledge of material, general knowledge, work ethic, love of students, etc. All those extra education-course requirements, along with the woefully low pay, just keep good teachers out of teaching. Students majoring in education typically have the lowest SAT scores of all the students on a college campus. Great, huh?

Smart teachers unshackled by teaching to the test (and freed from having to take a million teachers' classes at night just to be able to make a little more money) will have the time, energy, and creative freedom to plan great classes. When I taught high school physics, chemistry, and physical science I was given a course title, a lab closet filled with thirty year old junk, a chem lab with enough HCL, H2SO4, HNO3 and other stuff to eat a hole to the center of the earth, and enough sticks of Sodium to blow the water out of lake Murray. I had to pick text books, plan scope-and-sequence, order lab material, write my own tests (for which I gave partial credit on most questions since it was so much math based - so, no machine scoring for me), clean up those closets, you name it. Hard work, huge amounts of time, most nights up late preparing or grading (I think I made $13,000 my first year - oh, but I had all summer to holiday in Spain, right John?), but we had some fun and compelling classes.

We need to break up the school districts. I am not convinced these consolidated monster districts actually save us money but even if they do it's not worth it. It makes the system seem like the Queen Mary navigating the Haw River. It's just too big, too slow, too cumbersome, too "one size fits all." Break it up. Smash it. Give more leeway to the local principles. Give more freedom to the local teachers.

All the new construction in the world won't make up for poor teachers. Give me good teachers in ratty buildings over mediocre teachers in new buildings any day. With good teachers magic happens.

And Republicans, just be quiet already about merit pay. It doesn't work. There are no objective criteria that won't end up meaning more conferences, more classes, more time "in the system" under the sway of the unholy trinity. The only way to discern real merit is subjectively, and that will never fly, unless we follow a military model and promote those we know by observation worthy of promotion. I don't think that will work.

As I have said before, it is one of the hardest things in the world to be a good teacher. If you have not done it I don't think you have any idea how demanding it is. It's a 15 hour a day job. It's exhausting. And it's rewarding. But it pretty much becomes your life. I'm afraid it's also way too easy to be a bad teacher. If we raise academic entry requirements (as in, you know, med school) and raise pay substantially, teacher quality will take care of itself, and we'll just have to let the bad teachers retire out of the system.

I realize that my ideas won't in reality be passed either. But Obama is dreaming if he thinks that just casting off NCLB is going to bring in some golden era of education. It will just bring us back to the same mediocre place we were in before. That's a place I don't want to be. American public education will still suck.

Oh, and one more thing...speaking of special interests...we tend to think of such interests as corporate, Madison avenue, greedy old men in suits...but the aforementioned educational triumvirate is a triple play of special interests and lobbying. Just cross them, you'll see.

Going Back to School

I don’t know if it was getting all the mailers from AARP (in anticipation of my 50th birthday I presume), reading the article in Time Magazine about people working into their 100’s, reading “The Earth is Flat” by Thomas Friedman, or just listening to the clock ticking inside me, but I have been moved to think about some unfinished business of late, and preparing myself for a calling I sense upon me, and for employment for, you know, when I get old!

So, I am taking a couple of classes this term in Plant Science – at NC State – starting tomorrow.

There are several strands of motivation…

First, I have a crummy BS degree in Biology with so many obvious holes I wouldn’t give myself a second look if I were looking at my transcript. I have been wanting to fill in those holes for 30 years. And, well, I’m just out of date.

Second, as I have written before, I have sense of calling upon my life to tend to the care God’s creation. There are some folks in the community motivated to start a non profit local Christian environmental association. We’re working on the details – the vision and mission – though that may take a little while. Upgrading my credentials will give me more credibility in that area as well as more exposure to people involved in these things from State, Chapel Hill, and Duke

Third, filling up some of the holes in my knowledge will help me as I seek to frame better some of the writing projects that have been rattling around in my head for years. I still want to write that “Natural History of Guilford County”!

Fourth, as I begin moving into second half of my century :), I want to be ready to supplement my income, or do a different thing down the road when I’m, you know, older. Building upon what I started doing a long time ago seemed to be the best approach.

Why NC State? Because of all the universities anywhere near they have been the most receptive and they have the program that best fits my background and goals.

Basically I will leave about 7:30 or 7:45 AM on Tuesdays and Thursdays and get back about the same time PM. I’ve tested the route – I’ll be taking 421 to 64 to I-440 right into the heart of the campus. I have two classes – one from 10AM to 1PM and the other from 4:30AM to 5:45PM.

It is interesting…I can already feel the cobwebs starting to come off my brain as I get ready. Yes, I think intellectually and physically I have been in a rut for a while, just due to following the same pattern day to day for 14 years. It’s amazing how turning on another part of the brain gives light to the rest! I already feel more creative and mentally energetic.

As a Christian pastor working for the most part with professing Christian people in a Christian church setting, the truth is, I can lose touch with what life looks like and feels like for people who are not professing Christians – whether they are simply not religious or whether they are of different faiths. I’m kind of looking forward to rubbing shoulders with a broader diversity of people again. Just might make me a better person, and better Christian.

Yes, this means I will be working later on the other days and more on Saturdays and in the evenings. I watch too much TV anyway. But I plan to be there with my “24” compatriots in January!

This is kind of an experiment. We’ll see how it goes. If it does not seem to work out well for me or for the church I pastor I won’t do it again. It’s a one term experiment.

I think it will be fun, and definitely fun-gal (one of the courses is The Kingdom of the Fungi!)

For those that got this far, thank you for reading this post and bearing with my verbosity. Maybe jumping back into the world of scientifically concise descriptions will cure me of that problem a little!

Joel

An Open Letter to John Hammer

Dear John,

Although I am, generally speaking, a fiscal and social conservative, and thus more often than not agree with you on a range of other issues, after several years of seeing you put into print the salaries of those in the higher range of pay in our school system, I must finally offer my objections.

I want first to address my own view of your reporting of the names and salaries of these emplyees. In doing so I am going to deal primarily with teachers.

The manner in which Guilford County schools pays teachers is established by strict formula. This is published on their public web site. Anybody can find it out. There is a dismally low starting salary for a starting teacher with a college degree, and then salaries increase slowly based upon years of experience, advanced educational degrees, and certain approved extra certification processes. There is no mystery here. But to publish names and salaries as you do is, to my way of thinking, just nosiness and bad form. It would be better, if you just had to make your wrongheaded point, to publish the pay scales themselves, and perhaps the number of teachers who fit into each range of pay, say $30-40,000, $40-5000, etc. There is just no point in putting names to salaries except to create ill will, usually misguided, between people of our community and our teachers. You aren’t reporting the whole truth nor the appropriate context, so you are only half informing the public anyway. A little knowledge is a dangerous thing.

And, in fact, what you have published, at least regarding teacher salaries, proves the exact opposite of what you intend. We have a county of almost 450,000 people with one giant unified school system. That system has thousands of teachers (maybe you could come up with that number for us). Of these thousands, the very highest paid of all of them who is not an athletic director, is a person with 35 years of experience, a Ph. D., and National Board Certification. And she gets paid only $70,000. That is pathetic! What does that mean about the rest of the bell curve? Yes, that it is low, too low, way too low. Thank you for proving my long held contention that we pay our teachers way too little.

Look at the lower end of the scale. The entry salary for teachers, given that a college degree plus teacher certification is required, is abysmal. It is no wonder that it is hard to get college graduates to go into teaching. Yes, there are other things that contribute to teaching being a difficult field of work and which keep people from pursuing it. Again, these conditions argue for more and not less pay for teachers who must endure many indignities and much abuse along the way.

I was a public school teacher for five years back in the 1980’s. I taught physics, chemistry, biology, and physical science. My starting salary was $13,000. I had six years of college education when I started. I was rolling in the dough.

I can personally attest that teaching, if a teacher seeks to do it well, is exhausting work from morning to night. Standing up in a room and engaging five or six classes of students a day, even in good school conditions, is incredibly draining. I do not think most people have any idea what it requires in terms of energy and stamina. Then there are often conferences or tutoring times before school, and the inevitable dealing with parents who are upset because little Johnny made a C on a paper. Teachers live under a constant cloud of lawsuits in our litigious society. You would have no idea how often parents threaten court if they don’t get their way. There is endless paper work. Then one has to prepare for one’s classes. For any conscientious teacher this means hours of work at home every night, and the constant fear of not being totally on top of things. There is much anxiety and stress related to this issue of daily readiness, which accounts curiously for the almost universal nightmares that teachers have. Then of course there is the task of correcting and grading papers and often taking night classes to try to upgrade one's standing. There is pressure that never lets up. There are issues of safety, of threat, and intimidation. OK, so some readers say that I am describing their lives. Well, then they should have sympathy for our teachers.

And of course, in our system teachers must work now under the indignity of EOG’s being the be all and end all. This is sapping the motivation and energy and creativity of our best teachers, forcing them into being automatons rather than the caring creative intelligent people that most of them are.

But rather than creating good will in the eyes of the public, you are causing people, due to the lack of full reporting, to draw false conclusions about teachers who already are insufficiently paid, and in some cases causing people to draw false conclusions about particular individuals. This will only sap public motivation to provide the resources our schools and teachers desperately need. You are doing the general public good a great disservice. I do not believe that it is in the public good to continue to put together names to salaries before the face of the public as you do. There are other and more honoring ways of making your very poor point.

Add the idea that teachers have two months off is such a total joke that is does not become a man of your otherwise high intelligence. Because of their generally low pay, teachers constantly have to find work in those periods of time when they are not due in the classroom. I did this for five years. Having a ten month contract was a burden in my mind, not a blessing. What, do you think they are using all their extra money from their inflated salaries to sit on beaches in Aruba? Come on John. That “time off” is no holiday. In addition to needing to find work in the summer, many teachers must spend the two months of summer taking classes so that they can get to a higher grade in the pay scale, or, in some cases, so that they can continue to teach what they teach - or so as to have their contracts renewed.

Yes, many government employees are paid inadequately. Rather than this being an argument to lower teacher pay, maybe it should be an argument to raise general government employee pay.

John, I just don’t think you have enough appreciation and gratitude for the myriads of public servants who work hard day in and day out to make your life better and safer.

On one point I agree. We have too many assistant superintendents draining away too many resources. There is a bloated bureaucracy above the teachers. If we could eliminate jobs there, we could pay teachers a little more. I would be all for that.

And I admit to the fact that it is easier than it should be to be slack as a teacher. We have all known slack teachers (and slack lawyers, accountants, doctors, and pastors). It is hard to find a formula or a procedure for measuring true effectiveness and thereby increasing true accountability. That is an area that still needs work, but I am describing a small minority of our teachers.

Back to the one non athletic director you singled out, just listen to yourself. We have a person with 35 years of experience, a Ph. D., and a demanding National Board Certification, and you’re complaining that she makes $70,000. Let’s compare similar years of experience, education, and certification with people from dozens of other professional vocational areas. Why don’t you do that, John?

This teacher who is the highest paying non athletic director is also my friend. She is a great teacher, and she has paid her dues in 35 years of educational experience. She earns her salary. She loves her work and her students. She is a good and faithful public servant. So are the thousands of teachers below her in the salary scale, many of whom also are my friends. I wish you would find another way to make your misguided point, a way that is not intended to embarrass and disparage individuals. It is beneath you.

Joel Gillespie