Roasted Teacher has been successful beyond our imagining, and our small little tutoring company can’t always meet the demand from our clients. That’s why I’m happy to announce that we’re looking for tutors. The requirements are pretty simple: you must live in the Greater Boston area, you must agree to a background check, and you need to be effective teaching and tutoring in one-on-one situations. We are happy to accept a wide range of subjects, including but definitely not limited to foreign languages, sciences, mathematics, and computers. Also, if you are good at the academic standardized tests – GED, SAT, PSAT, SSAT, LSAT, MCAT, GMAT, GRE, PRAXIS, just to name a few – and have score reports to back it up, then we’re interested in those, too! If you think you’d be a good fit with Roasted Teacher, drop me an email at bernie@roastedteacher.com. Be sure to include a resume!

Thanks,

Bernie

Hi Paul,

I just read your article on tutoring with interest, as I started a small tutoring business, Roasted Teacher, here in Boston in June. I do my best to make it affordable to everyone. Although my regular rate is $40 per hour, I only charge $15 per hour if someone pays upfront and is willing to come to my office. Although I don’t make much money from these clients, they still get the help they need and I help students in my community, which is very important to me personally.

Thanks for the good work!

Sincerely,

Bernie Luger
Roasted Teacher
www.roastedteacher.com

For far too long, our country inhibited people from pursuing a higher education based solely on the color of their skin. It was not long ago that South Africa also treated their black citizens as second-class members of society, and the economic differential between blacks and whites (both here and in South Africa) tells us much work yet needs to be done. There are still plenty of places in the world where opportunities are denied to people based upon race, color, faith, or national origin. I can’t help but wonder how many Einsteins, von Brauns, Dantes, St. Augustines, and Archimedes there have been that never had the opportunities to develop their talents. While we can’t worry too much about those that might have existed in the past, we have the power to help those here in our own country today.

We can do this by remembering the words of Thurgood Marshall when he argued Brown v. Board of Education in front of the Supreme Court: “[E]quality means getting the same thing, at the same time and in the same place.” Our education data is replete with examples that minority children are not receiving the same education as white children. To be sure, the source of some of this differential comes from poor living conditions at home, poor family structures, and even poor attitudes concerning education. But I cannot believe that those issues explain most of the problem: average people want to improve their lives, and will work toward that goal if given a chance. The poor condition of inner-city schools, the lack of qualified teachers and master teachers willing to teach in those schools, and the constant turnover of professional staff in those schools means that our inner-city schools – which are predominantly minority attended – suffer disproportionately from their suburban counterparts.

We need to wake up and smell the coffee. We need to get equality in funding and staffing. And we need to do it by lifting everyone up, not by taking from the rich and giving to the poor. Figure out how you can help and go get started! Tell us here in the comments what you do to help.

You can create nice 18 x 54 vinyl banner for only $0.01 + $7.95 s/h using code “SSV3XE” at checkout. Navigate to the Banners page and choose the kind of banner you want on the right side of the page, then choose the size (18 x 54) and details. I remember the days when these things would have cost $50 or more.  Enjoy!

War has been declared over teacher accountability in Washington, D.C.  There have been several skirmishes up until now; last year Rhee laid off 266 teachers, and used the opportunity to pick and choose the one’s she didn’t like.  This year, Michelle Rhee negotiated a new teachers’ contract with weakened tenure protections in trade for raises of 20% or more.  One part of the contract included new evaluation methods that include using a teacher’s students’ test scores as 50% of the evaluation.  If the students don’t improve, then teachers can be fired for poor performance.

Scores came back from this year’s evaluations and 165 teachers didn’t make the cut (the other teachers got fired for other reasons, including not having proper licensing.)  What many of these news outlets have failed to report is that only 20% of the teaching force was evaluated for test score growth – a total of about 800 teachers were evaluated this way.  Of those teachers, 26 were fired for poor performance.  That’s 3.25% of those that were evaluated on score performance.

The union intends to challenge the dismissals, and this is undoubtedly headed to court.  Other districts and states will be watching this case closely for guidance in pursuing new accountability proposals.

Our course is only $499 for 30 hours of preparation activity, including four sample tests and 6 classroom sessions.  The course workbook and an additional practice CD-ROM is included in the price.  The course is located in Revere, MA; please check out this link for more information on courses, dates, and times.

Dry Dock

Bernie @ the USS Constitution

Crew Quarters

The USS Constitution, launched in 1797, is undergoing restoration for the 200th anniversary of the War of 1812. Sails will behoisted and she will sail on her own for the celebration. The Constitution has not sailed under its own power since her 200th birthday in 1997; it’s unlikely we will see it again in our lifetimes. She is the flagship of our active-duty Naval fleet – it’s considered special duty in the Navy.

I took Bernie IV there for his birthday today. They have now replaced the masts and are finishing the main deck. She’s looking fine!

A classic case of doing the wrong thing for the right reasons.  If we fire all the good people just to get money, then education will devolve into simply a pursuit of funds to build new buildings and buy new teaching toys while having a severely degraded teaching force to use those tools.  We need to fix this law before more good people get hurt.

Buried in NCLB and Race to the Top are some good ideas:  Fire bad teachers.  Close or reorganize bad schools. I don’t think that anyone is actually opposed to firing a bad teacher who doesn’t do their job effectively and doesn’t improve after being given a reasonable chance to do so (I hope not, anyway.)  Nor do I think that schools that consistently perform poorly, even after additional help and funding is provided, should be left to provide our children with a substandard education.

All this being said, I am distressed by the one-mindedness of the current reform movement.  Testing, more testing, and then evaluating the teacher.  Rinse, repeat.  How about some effort to address the fundamental problems in both our laws and our communities that are hurting our efforts to educate our children?

First, we need to figure out what we did in the last 20 years that makes parents believe that school attendance is optional.  I have sat in my share of parent-teacher conferences when the the parent explains that getting their kid to school is difficult in the morning.  When I point out that there is a school bus system, the parent often says, “Well, my child doesn’t ride the bus.”  I would love to compare attendance records from 20 years ago to now.  I will eat my hat if attendance isn’t worse now than it was then.  Parents need to be held accountable, and the truancy laws need to be amended to put the burden of proof on the parent, in a court of law, that school absences were necessary once it gets past 5 or 6 in a semester.

Second, we need to bring back a levelling system to public education. For those unfamiliar with the concept, a leveling system separates students according to ability so that all students can be taught effectively at their level of understanding.  Leveling went out of style about 20 years ago because it was looked at as meritocratic.  Also, the legitimate complaint that it can be hard for a student to move through the levels played a major part in the decision to take it out of most school systems.  A well-run leveling system, however, provides each student with the best opportunity possible to learn at their level.  Without leveling, teachers face a Morton’s Fork:  either teach to the students at the top of the class causing their struggling classmates to fall behind, or teach to the bottom of the class and let the students at the top not achieve their potential.  Our current system of “one class fits all” forces teachers in practice to choose the latter.

Third, we need to make sports and extracurricular activities clearly secondary to educational objectives.  The message must still be sent loud and clear:  “You are here to learn academics.  If you are unable to do so effectively, then we will not allow you to spend valuable time playing sports or going to dances when we can be using that time to help you with academics.”  Students that cannot manage a 3.0 average with no grade worse than a C should not be playing sports – they should be getting help.  Districts that have adopted this policy have discovered that the students who want to play (or go to dances) will figure out how to get a 3.0.

Fourth, we need to offer after-school tutoring for ALL students, and make it mandatory for any student with D’s or F’s.  These tutors should be knowledgeable in the subjects being taught; if that means that a student needs help in Latin, then a Latin teacher/tutor needs to be found.

Fifth, figure out when homework became optional.  I think this is just as much the fault of teachers as it is parents and students, but the expectation needs to be changed:  homework every class, three days a week.  Homework is the only way to put understanding into permanent memory.

Schools that take these steps will come out winners.  Where is your child’s school on these five steps?  Let me know below!