Quantcast

Don’t blame teachers for lax discipline

By Ron Isaac

In a letter published a few days ago in a New York City tabloid, Francisco Castillo may have been spot-on with his observation that the movement against Common Core testing is not hitting the right target, but he is woefully off-base with his identification of the supposedly right target.

He claims that the effects of weak classroom discipline are at fault for the resistance to testing because exam results would incriminate the persons responsible. He blames “teachers, politicians and union leaders.” He’s at least two-thirds wrong.

Teachers and union leaders have zero binding input into the creation and enforcement of the Department of Education’s Discipline Code. But if they don’t abide by it, they risk fines, suspensions or terminations. Since they are the front-liners who must bear the brunt of anti-social behavior, what sense would it make for them to favor a lax discipline policy?

Politicians are a different story. They can walk away from the havoc they cause. Teachers cannot. For them it is concrete. To many, though not all politicians, it is just an abstraction until it rebounds and dents their own prestige. Politicians typically stake out their views on education issues and advocate them quite passionately. They pass legislation and uphold programs and policies for one primary reason: to advance ambition, jockey for prominence, ingratiate themselves with others who have access to power and finally to secure that power and temporal stature for themselves. As long as those objectives are achieved, they categorically will adopt any viewpoint and join any alliances whether venal or righteous.

Politicians are not bad people any more than sharks and vipers are bad animals. One is programmed by human nature and the other by Mother Nature. “Voicer” Castillo should have done his due diligence about Common Core instead of using teachers and union leaders as his default scapegoat.

Ron Isaac

Bayside