In response to yesterday’s post, “The Dumbing Down Of What It Means To Be A Great Teacher,” Vic responded by asking, “What is your definition of a ‘great’ teacher, or an ‘excellent School,’ and to what degree should that definition be quantifiable?”

Vic, an attempt at a partial answer — here is my definition this morning of a “great teacher”:

A great teacher is one who has a message of truth, one who makes disciples of that truth, and one who succeeds in bringing enlightenment.  A teacher is great, because the truth that he or she teaches is great, and because the teacher makes that truth accessible to those willing to be disciplined.

Einstein was a great teacher. He disciplined himself to truth and brought enlightenment to himself and to humanity. He made that truth accessible to those willing to be disciplined. He modeled enlightened thinking.

It is interesting to consider what Johnny’s seventh grade math teacher could do, if he or she were motivated, to follow the model of what it means to be a “great teacher,” as shown by Einstein and other great ones throughout history.  The role of the public school teacher has become trivialized and constrained.

I heard William Glasser, psychologist and author of “The Quality School,” ask an audience of public school teachers:  “What is your number one job?”  Glasser followed up by declaring, “No — your number one job is not teaching. It is managing. In today’s schools a teacher’s biggest job is to be an effective manager.”

Glasser’s observation is right. And schools of education are focused on preparing future teachers to act as effective managers, guided by bureaucratic expectations. Johnny’s teacher is expected to be a good manager of his or her students and to get the students to advance in their competence in seventh grade math — as measured in test scores.

I agree with Davis Guggenheim, “Waiting for Superman” director, when he says, “We can’t have great schools without great teachers.”

But the problem is, the present system defines a “great teacher” as one whose students produce great test scores. In the big picture, this is a trivial definition.

Let’s agree, for the sake of argument, that within a few years, computers will be equipped with such compelling programs and will be guided by an ever improved artificial intelligence, that these machines will be effective teachers in all areas of curriculum.  In terms of today’s definition, these machines will be “great teachers” because their students will produce great test scores.

Teachers are haughty in their conviction that they will never be replaced by machines. But, if teaching is simply defined as transmitting curriculum and “great teaching” is defined as producing great student test scores, then, of course eventually machines will do these objectifiable tasks much better than humans, and at much less cost.

Teachers, for the sake of the future of their profession, need to describe what it means to be a “great teacher” in a way that elevates the teaching profession beyond what is replaceable by a machine.  OK. I am providing here my definition of a “great teacher” for free — that says, in part, (above):  A teacher is great because the truth he or she teaches is great.

The point of education is to develop the skills, habits, attitudes, thoughtfulness, knowledge, needed to mature into one’s full potential.  The great truths that a great teacher makes available gives insight into one’s potential and how that potential can be fulfilled. The essence of education is to “Know thyself” to develop one’s self, to understand one’s self — and to know and understand the world and society one is part of.  The surest way to develop into a mature human — worldly wise and empowered in one’s own thinking — is to apprentice oneself to a human who is already on the right path. The teacher / student relationship is one settled deep in our psyche. A child’s first, and most important, teachers are his or her parents.

What is clear is that many children and many adults have never had the opportunity to apprentice themselves to a worthy role model — someone worthy of their respect, someone who through their behaviors and attitudes could serve as a good example of a person developing into maturity. A great teacher is someone who demonstrates growth toward human maturity and someone who empowers his or her apprentices to do the same.

We each of us start — like an acorn — with a great potential. But few of us grow into the tall and strong oaks needed for our democracy.  I discussed the acorn / oak view of human maturity in Thoughts Occasioned By the Death of Tim Russert

Few of us grow into our maturity.  A great teacher is one who can show the way, because he or she is a practitioner of the way.  Great teachers can be found among the ranks of those teaching seventh grade math, unappreciated by the system — except to the extent that his or her success is measured in test scores. What is needed is a system that is built to sustain and empower great teaching and great teachers.

The transformation that is needed in public education, I believe, is possible via an awakened democracy. The starting point is an in-depth discussion of foundational questions.   This contemplation of how to define a “great teacher” will be part of the book I am contemplating,  “Public Education in Kettering Ohio in The Year 2025”

See:

• How Authentic Teaching Is More Like Raising Beets Than It Is Like Building a House
• Why Are There No Teachers in Kettering Schools Who Earn $200,000 Per Year — Or Even More?

There’s a lot in the news about the importance of teacher quality, a lot of talk about the need for “great teachers.”

The Obama administration stimulated the discussion about “great teachers” in its “Race To The Top” competition. States were asked to compete with each other for $4.4 billion in funds, and, in the application process for RTTT, the area where states could earn the most “points” was in the quality of their plans to develop “Great Teachers and Leaders.”

That teachers should strive for “greatness” is a powerful idea — because it is an idea that forces the discussion about education to focus on fundamental questions:  What is the task of a teacher?  What are the signs, the evidence, of “greatness” in teaching?

Usually, we reserve the title “great” for the rare individual whose accomplishments far outshine the accomplishments of his or her contemporaries. There are many wonderful opera singers, but only a few, throughout history, are designated as “great.” There are many competent lawyers, or music composers, or political and military leaders — but few who are considered “great.”

But, apparently, the Obama administration has dumbed down the meaning of “greatness” in teaching so that it is reasonable to think that every child should have a great teacher. When Secretary of Education, Arne Duncan, for example, says, “There is nothing more important we can do for this country than to get a great teacher in front of every child,” it’s hard to understand what his exaggerated statement really means.

There is no reasonable definition of “greatness,” I can think of, where “greatness” could become common.  But, the “Waiting for Superman” web-site declares, “Every child deserves a great teacher.”

What is meant by a “great teacher” is explained, helpfully, in an Atlantic article, “What Makes a Great Teacher?”, that tells about an inner city, Washington D.C., math teacher, William Taylor. The article says this teacher is “great” because,

“Based on his students’ test scores, Mr. Taylor ranks among the top 5 percent of all D.C. math teachers. On that first day of school, only 40 percent of Mr. Taylor’s students were doing math at grade level. By the end of the year, 90 percent were at or above grade level.  … Put concretely, if Mr. Taylor’s student continued to learn at the same level for a few more years, his test scores would be no different from those of his more affluent peers in Northwest D.C.”

Mr. Taylor, I agree, should be commended for his good work, but, the fact that Mr. Taylor’s students are showing acceptable competency fails to convince me that he is a “great teacher.” It is not reasonable that “great teaching” should be so simply indicated.

The notion that scores of minimum competency should be what designates “greatness” in teaching is a goofy idea that aligns with a similar ridiculous notion, embraced in Ohio, that a school should be officially designated “excellent,” if sufficient numbers of its students are meeting minimum standards.

The inexcusable dumbing down of what is meant by “great teachers” and “excellent schools”  is the foundation for the destruction of the current teaching profession, the foundation, in fact, for the destruction of meaningful public education.

It seems clear that in only a very few years, if the purpose of education is so shallow, the professionalism of its practitioners so diminished, sophisticated computer programs will replace teachers.  Such programs will do what effective teachers now do — everything that works to get students to score high on objective tests.  Such programs would deliver a personalized program based on the student’s learning styles, past experiences, likes and dislikes; would use a positive reinforcement reward system of motivation, probably with real money or other premiums; would be guided by a rigorous, multi-layered, measurable curriculum.  The Age of Intelligent Machines is upon us and gaining public support for the objectification of education is a needed first step toward justifying the eventual computerization, dehumanization, of education.

If what constitutes “great teaching” is all programmable, all objectifiable, it stands to reason that eventually “great teaching” will be computerized. The adults who will be hired to monitor the machines will be required to have good personalities to connect with children, but, unlike today’s teachers, these workers will be subjects of the machines, and as such will have no reasonable claim that they deserve salaries appropriate for a well trained and experienced professional.

I can almost see a nightmare version of the book I propose to write — Kettering Public Education In The Year 2025 — where the machines have taken over.  In this nightmare version of the future, the principal of the school is called upon to resolve disputes between the monitors of the machine (also known as “teachers”) and the machine itself — but, the principal, himself, is a machine. According to some futurists, such ascension of the machines is a profound possibility. It might be fun to try putting together a short story with such a theme.

Teachers’ unions and anyone who cares about the future of public education should be crying bloody murder about the dumbing down of what it means to be an “excellent school” or what it means to be a “great teacher.”    Teachers’ unions and anyone who cares should be lifting up a compelling vision of “great teaching” and “excellent schools” — a vision that aims at accomplishing a much higher purpose in public education than what we are now being asked to settle for.