Following on the heels of suggested changes to the student and teacher elements of K-12 education in the US, this post will focus on the system itself. I’ll cover aspects of the system reaching down from the national set all the way to the individual classroom. With that said, the following are just a jumping off point for fixing the system. They’re not necessarily in any kind of order, but the first is the primary issue that needs to be fixed.
Qualified Leaders
The biggest issue, from what I’ve read and experienced, is fairly easy to identify yet never seems to be directly discussed. Why are the people in charge of education in the US actually there? Since the Carter administration separated the job of Secretary of Education from the areas of Health and Welfare, there have been 11 full time appointees and a handful of interim position holders. Of the list of people of officially held the title of Secretary of Education, you would think there would be a plethora of people with advanced degrees in education and classroom experience, especially at the K-12 level since most of our national endeavors come from this office. The actual number who have both qualifications is comical:
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