'Best business practices' questioned for education on The Murfreesboro Post

Sidebar Ads

'Best business practices' questioned for education

Related Articles

Expert: RCS credibility destroyed

Mayor: Rutherford County will not see tax hike

Tennessee science scores improve

June 1 MTSU Alumni Summer College deadline approaches

Lunch, learn about raising healthy kids

Can we really have it all? EPA regs, new jobs

Tennessee rejects No Child Left Behind standards

FirstBank teaches children financial literacy

Bradley Academy is now accepting applications

College graduates face tough job market

View All

By: RANDY O'BRIEN, Tennessee News Service

Posted: Monday, January 17, 2011 3:31 pm

NASHVILLE - Some Tennessee educators are challenging the wisdom of politicians' promises to apply business principles to public education.

Newly inaugurated Gov. Bill Haslam touted his skills at running a major transportation service in his campaign, and promised to reform state government by using sound business practices to the delivery of government services. But Tennessee Education Association president Jera Summerford says forcing teachers to compete against each other for grants or merit pay is counterproductive.

"We know that schools that work best are schools where teachers work collaboratively and they support one another, and they learn from one another and they're not in any way set up to be competitive with one another. So, that's certainly a place where the business model does not apply."

Another difference, Summerford says, is that businesses' customers can choose where to spend their time and money, while students are legally obligated to go to school and have little say in the curricula and teaching style.

"The community does have certainly a say in what goes on in schools. They have that through their elected officials that govern their school districts and all the way up to the state government, but there's not that relationship between a provider and a client that there is in the business community."

Tennessee's recent success in the federal "Race to the Top" competition will provide merit money to recruit and retain educators. However, critics of "Race to the Top" say rewarding education reform is wasteful government spending.

Tagged under Education, Schools, TNNS

Member Opinions:

By: Sprtman on 1/20/11
Thats right Summerford, go ahead spout the union line, competition is bad Boo Hoo.
Wrong! We want competition to be the lifeblood of the system. The union system that rewards these lazy, incompetant teachers must go.
Thats correct Jera the customers don't have a choice in where to send their children. Thats why we have our children learning the black value system. 90 pregnant girls in a Memphis highschool ring a bell. Unfortunatly the unions fight us for our own tax dollars to keep the current system of lies and corruption, leading to an inferior product going. Vice giving us our own tax dallors in order to provide a better education for our children in private schools. Yea, we want choice not the union line forced upon us.
We want that relationship between provider and client that you will not give us. You are whats wrong with the system.

By: cmac on 1/21/11
Sprtman - Don't get insulted, but is your job devoted to spreading ignorance?