Sad but true . . .
"Let's face it: Most of the teachers in our public schools do not
have what it takes to develop high intellectual potential in students.
They cannot give students what they don't have themselves . . .
"Lack of competence is only part of the problem. Too often there is
not only a lack of appreciation of outstanding intellectual
development but a hostility towards it by teachers who are preoccupied
with the "self-esteem" of mediocre students, who may remind them of
what they were once like as students."
____________________________________________________
Smart 'Problems'
By Thomas Sowell
September 13, 2005
During my first semester of teaching, many years ago, I was surprised
to encounter the philosophy that the brightest students did not need
much help from the teacher because "they can get it anyway" and that
my efforts should be directed toward the slower or low-performing
students.
This advice came from my department chairman, who said that if the
brighter or more serious students "get restless" while I was directing
my efforts toward the slower students, then I should "give them some
extra work to do to keep them quiet."
I didn't believe that the real difference between the A students and
the C students was in inborn intelligence, but thought it was usually
due to differences in attitudes and priorities. In any event, my reply
was that what the chairman proposed "would be treating those who came
here for an education as a special problem!"
A few days later, I handed in my resignation. It turned out to be only
the first in a series of my resignations from academic institutions
over the years.
Unfortunately, the idea of treating the brighter or more serious
students as a problem to be dealt with by keeping them busy is not
uncommon, and is absolutely pervasive in the public schools. One
fa****onable solution for such "problem" students is to assign them to
help the less able or less conscientious students who are having
trouble keeping up.
In other words, make them unpaid teacher's aides!
High potential will remain only potential unless it is developed. But
the very thought that high potential should be developed more fully
never seems to occur to many of our educators -- and some are
absolutely hostile to the idea.
It violates their notions of equality or "social justice" and it
threatens the "self-esteem" of other students. As a result, too often
a student with the potential to become a future scientist, inventor,
or a discoverer of a cure for cancer will instead have his time tied
up doing busy work for the teacher.
Even so-called "gifted and talented" programs often turn out to be
simply a bigger load of the same level of work that other students are
doing -- keeping the brighter students busy in a separate room.
My old department chairman's notion that the better students "can
pretty much get it without our help" assumes that there is some "it"
-- some minimum competence -- which is all that matters.
People like this would apparently be satisfied if Einstein had
remained a competent clerk in the Swiss patent office and if Jonas
Salk, instead of discovering a cure for polio, had spent his career
puttering around in a laboratory and turning out an occasional
research paper of moderate interest to his academic colleagues.
If developing the high potential of some students wounds the
"self-esteem" of other students, one obvious answer is for them to go
their separate ways in different classrooms or different schools.
There was a time when students of different ability levels or
performance levels were routinely assigned to different cl***** in the
same grade or to different schools -- and no one else collapsed like a
house of cards because of wounded self-esteem.
Let's face it: Most of the teachers in our public schools do not have
what it takes to develop high intellectual potential in students. They
cannot give students what they don't have themselves.
Test scores going back more than half a century have repeatedly shown
people who are studying to be teachers to be at or near the bottom
among college students studying in various fields. It is amazing how
often this plain reality gets ignored in discussions of what to do
about our public schools.
Lack of competence is only part of the problem. Too often there is not
only a lack of appreciation of outstanding intellectual development
but a hostility towards it by teachers who are preoccupied with the
"self-esteem" of mediocre students, who may remind them of what they
were once like as students.
Maybe the advancement of science, of the economy, and finding a cure
for cancer can wait, while we take care of self-esteem.
------------
Thomas Sowell is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford
University, Stanford, CA 94305. His Web site is www.tsowell.com.
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"A passionate attachment of one nation for another produces a variety of
evils. Sympathy for the favorite nation . . . betrays [one nation] into a
participation in the quarrels and wars of the latter . . .
"Against the insidious wiles of foreign influence the jealousy of a free
people ought to be constantly awake, since history and experience prove
that foreign influence is one of the most baneful foes of republican
government.
"Nothing is more essential than that permanent, inveterate
antipathies against particular nations and passionate
attachments for others should be excluded."
-- President George Wa****ngton
Farewell Address
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