Personally, I hate to see all teachers lumped together in one category - especially since schools vary wildly by location. But, with that being said, I'll be honest. Teaching has a low threshold for entry and there are a lot of dumb (by conventional standards) or burnt out teachers out there. A quick caveat - I'm not talking about elementary teachers here. Any teacher who can take a class of 25 5-year-olds and teach them to sit still, follow directions, read and write in a year is more skilled in classroom management and loving than I could ever hope to be - this would be a totally different sort of intelligence than we're talking about here.
I worked for about seven years in a junior high. I worked with teachers who didn't speak correctly, who didn't know how to write in complete sentences (who were also certified English teachers) and math teachers who would come to me to help them understand how to teach 6th grade math. I was frankly quite disgusted by the whole system.
I was teaching in a blue collar district on the "working side" of Houston. A lot of the teachers were home grown and the school district was much more concerned about beating the rival football team one district over than anything else. I was a bad fit and was often told I was too "out of the box" or "intense" for [district.]
I agreed from about one week in and, but I stayed around because I am great at connecting with reluctant learners and did well with the "tough" kids that other teachers didn't handle well. They preferred to complain about the kids, yell at them and call them stupid. One told them they were all well suited for McDonalds - I'm sure that was very inspiring.
That's not to mention I knew what the hell I was doing because I was constantly teaching myself by reading about the science of education and psychology and trying new things to beat entropy. In a school of about forty teachers, there were quite frankly three of us who were "smart" in the sense that you are describing, and all three of us choose to teach, we didn't get there by default.
The teachers who were there by default (no other jobs, wanted summers off, wanted to coach, etc.) - they sucked, although some were great building relationships with the kids, but couldn't teach. They were often rude, ignorant and since most of my student population was Hispanic and didn't know how to work the system they got away with all sorts of bullshit that should have never occurred in a professional environment, least of all a school.
Finally, when I was pulled out of science to move back into English to cover for a teacher who had the right political connections in the district, but still managed to get forcibly arrested for a DUI in the middle of the small town, I was done.
As much as I loved those kids, I couldn't put up with that district any more and I moved to the district where I live and where I grew up. It's like night and day. In my current district, where I'm teaching high school - which is a much better fit for me than Junior High - the teachers don't have education degrees. They have math, science, English, whatever degrees and had to go back to get certified (like me!). Most of them chose to come and teach for altruistic reasons and because it's more of a calling than a job for most of us, we work our asses off.
I still work with the tough kids - we "protect the dropout rate" for the district of five 5A high schools. My school has the kids who would have dropped out, and many of them have for a time and then realized that they needed help to finish and came to us. We have the homeless kids, the pregnant kids, the kids suffering at home, the ones who don't fit in, the bullies, the bullied, etc. Roughly 80 percent of my school has ADHD and about a quarter are oppositional-defiant, bi-polar or schizophrenic. This is in a very affluent school district, mind you, where parents run the show.
And that makes all the difference. I'm proud to be one of the parents who stays very, very involved in my kid's school experience. Virtually every parent in my neighborhood is active in the schools, and the neighborhoods that surround us are the same way. If a teacher screws up, we're on her like white on rice. If a principal doesn't take care of business, there's a big stink at the school board meetings and it gets taken care of.
As both a teacher and a parent in the district I have a unique perspective. Many of our parents are very successful NASA scientists and engineers, entrepreneurs, oil and gas executives and others who you'd imagine fit into that category. These parents are proud of our school district and respect the teachers, but not because we have a great football team. In fact most of the parents have no idea how our football, lacrosse, soccer, swim, diving, baseball, etc. teams are doing. They are proud because in the schools were parents are active, the kids get an outstanding education.
The parents expect a huge amount from the schools, and in turn the teachers expect a huge amount from the parents and students. In both cases, we deliver. If a teacher is under performing - he or she is out, or will be mentored and watched closely until he or she develops into the sort of teacher this district wants. If they don't advance, they are encouraged to leave, and then helped out the door.
I was shocked the first time I saw a teacher fired - it had never happened before in my teaching experience, and I'll be honest - I was thrilled. I've always worked hard and do a great job because I know I can and because I want to. After eight years, I was finally working with a group where that was the norm rather than the exception. I hate working with slackers and crappy teachers.
Teachers have a special obligation, and having worked in industry with a degree in business and engineering, it's frankly exhausting to teach well. But at any given moment those good teachers can tell you what they are doing, why they are doing it and satisfy parents around here with the level of expertise expected. If not, there are consequences - FINALLY.
There are several of us in my high school who are excited to see some of these education bills passed. Bring it on! The crappy teachers are bringing us all down. I've never cared about the money, but I'd be thrilled to be paid more than the teacher next door because, quite frankly, I do a better job than the teacher next door - and the one next to her. I'm in Texas, which is a right-to-work state, so the union nonsense doesn't mean anything to me - we have crappy benefits and after almost 10 years teaching with a masters degree, I have yet to earn as much as I was making when I walked out of Power trading/accounting a decade ago. I pay for my own retirement, too.
I'm with everyone who says we need massive educational reform. I'd love to see a system that is more streamlined and challenging for students, perhaps with a tiered secondary rather than the "every child is ready for college" nonsense that made us do away with technology and skilled programs. They are coming back, finally, by the way.
It will be interesting to watch now that the Baby Boomers are finally getting out of the way - they seem to put up the most resistance to anything that makes sense from a fair business/compensation equation.
In the meantime, however, please qualify your statements - MANY teachers are overpaid for their workload and skill level - not ALL. SOME teachers aren't idiots and many have chosen to teach for altruistic reasons and are fortunate to be able to afford to do so. I make more writing 12-15 hours per week than I do teaching. How's that for teacher salaries v. the business world?
Others have worked one career to the point that they are comfortable with savings and can take a huge step down the career ladder. Working for less doesn't make us stupid - it makes us realistic about the obstacles in the industry we want to pursue. For the record, those of us who aren't necessarily the norm are resigned to being lumped in with the masses and getting less respect than we probably deserve, but again - it comes with the career. If you wanted to pay me more about boot out the crap teachers, however, I'm all for it.
In the meantime, my advice would be to research the hell out of your local school districts and ignore the results of the standardized tests (outside of AP and SAT scores). Good districts are the ones that are the product of the educators and community. They often have higher taxes and local bond as well, although this isn't always the case.
