[TheForge] test?

[Aaron Silver]

At 09:58 AM 2/6/2002 -0500, you wrote:

>    Students should do reviews of teachers twice a year, yeah, you'll
>get reviews with vendettas, those should be easy to pick out. But
>large numbers of poor reviews of any one teacher should be
>investigated, teachers are too unaccountable.

Unfortunately the true merit of a teacher may not be felt for a period of 
time afterwards. I remember a few teachers that were not my favorites in 
High School, but who I look back on years later and realize they were among 
the best I had. Why? Not because they made me want to come to class each 
day, but because they held me to standards that I had to stretch to reach. 
They were among the teachers everyone dreaded getting in high school. If 
they were ranked by students, they would have been out long before I ever 
reached their classrooms. And if they had been removed, my education would 
be lacking even more than it was when I graduated.

We all have the ability to educate the youth around us, and we shouldn't be 
too focused on the established education system as the be-all and end-all 
for this education. While I liked to think that I could turn my brain off 
at the end of the school day, the fact is that I learned a lot outside of 
school. Boy scouts for me taught me some things, and with the help of 
people on this list the Metalworking merit badge has been re-introduced. 
I've got books on my shelf showing buses outfitted with multiple 
workstations to bring basic woodworking projects and skills to groups of 
kids, whether at day-care/summer-camp/community-centers, etc. Four-H, Girl 
Scouts, and a slew of other organizations are aimed at broadening the 
horizons of our youth.

At this time I don't have any easy answers or solutions for getting the 
established education system to re-integrate the hands-on skills back into 
the curriculum. At least not in the face of dedicated opposition that many 
have decried on this list. I would however ask people to look outside that 
system. For instance Home Schooling in your area may provide the chance to 
try the broad-curriculum study of bridges... to show how well it works, and 
to be able to provide concrete examples of how this type of integrated 
learning could be a valuable tool for the established school system.

Anyway, that's my $0.02 worth.

Aaron Silver