Why Shouldn't Doctors Have Their Pay Docked

when their patients die or lawyers lose out on fat paydays when they lose their cases? Those ideas are just as sensible as paying teachers on the basis of what their students do, even if their students "blow off" standardized tests and "Christmas tree" them.

It couldn't be any outside influences that affect learning — not the inattention of parents, not whatever roiling events outside school walls might make it difficult to learn, not too-crowded classes, not administrators and policy makers who don't really get what teachers do.

Something very detrimental to learning has been happening under the guise of education reform for nearly two decades. Americans have been convinced that standardization is education. They have been convinced that the way to "excellence" is to treat children's minds like one treats tomatoes during canning season.

In the process, too many Americans have swallowed the propaganda that those who don't buy the standard (King James?) version of school accountability employed by state after state don't support excellence.