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from the those-who-can,-do,-those-who-can't,-teach dept.
In the US: this article presents an analysis how a person's chosen college major corresponds to their IQ. The interesting thing is that the relationship has remained essentially stable over the past 70 years. At the top of the list are math, science and engineering. At the absolute bottom of the list: education.
These data show that US students who choose to major in education, essentially the bulk of people who become teachers, have for at least the last seven decades been selected from students at the lower end of the academic aptitude pool. A 2010 McKinsey report (pdf) by Byron Auguste, Paul Kihn, and Matt Miller noted that top performing school systems, such as those in Singapore, Finland, and South Korea, "recruit 100% of their teacher corps from the top third of the academic cohort."
The article points out that it isn't quite this simple: Top schools place high requirements on all of their students; poor schools generally attract lower quality students in all of their programs. Still, the national averages are clear: overall, the least intelligent students go on to teach. This is an odd priority.
Educational organizations, of course, have a different view. This article claims that teacher quality declined from the 1960s through the 1990s, but has since recovered, with teachers being barely below average (48th percentile) among college graduates.
On a related note, there is a strong international correlation between teacher pay and student outcomes. The (rather obvious) theory is that higher pay attracts better candidates to the teaching profession.
No conclusions - just thought this might spark an interesting discussion...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 01 2016, @06:42PM
Actually, she teaches special education students. If any classroom of kids is going to chew you up and spit you out, it'd be them. She's been doing it for a long time and she's great at it.
Really? I don't think that's a good example. I think lots of people have more patience with dumb animals and really stupid people. Look at the amount of shit they put up with from their cats/dogs and how well they still treat their cats/dogs in return. And I'm not sure it's because cats and dogs don't get the right to vote... Then compare with how much patience many of the same people have with other people...
Also the really stupid people usually don't have enough intelligence to get under your skin or figure out what really pushes your buttons. Their parents are very unlikely to expecting you to get their precious princes and princesses into MIT. Neither you nor others expect as much from them so you're not as annoyed when they fail.
It's like how people treat 2-3 year olds finger painting something that's really not amazing, "Oh honey that's wonderful". If a non-retarded non "special ed" 15 year old kid was to do the same painting people wouldn't be saying "oh honey that's wonderful" (unless they're clever enough to pass themselves off as some modern art "artist" ;) ).
(Score: 2) by darkfeline on Saturday July 02 2016, @02:20AM
>I think lots of people have more patience with dumb animals and really stupid people.
That's an interesting observation because recently, I've found that the best way to deal with stupid people is to not treat them as if they were equals, but to treat them as really retarded puppies. I no longer get angry about some of the shit they come up with because I don't expect anything from them. The fact that they can form a coherent sentence exceeds my expectations.
What a world of difference a slight change of perspective can make!
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