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Comment by benrbray | Hacker News Reader

I agree with your point about not blaming teachers for factors beyond their control, but let's not forget that when students spend most of their lives at school, teachers can play a big role in fostering a positive learning culture.

A child raised by American parents who attends a school in Japan (where students are expected to, for example, clean their own classrooms) will have a dramatically different experience than if they attend an American school.

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True. The problem is that when ratios are 1:30 (teacher:student) or sometimes even higher, it is hard for teachers to influence individual kids rather than spending all their time playing fire-fighter to a handful of problem students (often with pre-existing issues from home).

Can you please point me to an under-performing school with that ratio? In my experience, the under-performing schools receive between 50% and 100% percent more funding than high performing schools and have very low teacher student ratios. Thanks.

Mississippi is one of the worst performing states in the US (by multiple metrics[0]), to quote state policy (Mississippi Code Ann. Section 37-151-77):

> 28.3 Student teacher ratios do not exceed 30 to 1 in self-contained classes serving grades 5-8. {MS Code 37-151-77} A one-year waiver may be requested for classes that do not exceed more than two (2) students beyond the allowable student teacher ratio.

And:

> 28.4 Student teacher ratios do not exceed 33 to 1 in departmentalized academic core classes serving grades 5-12. {MS Code 37-151-77} A one-year waiver may be requested for classes that do not exceed more than two (2) students beyond the allowable student teacher ratio.

[0] https://www.gulflive.com/news/2019/07/mississippis-school-sy...

[1] Jackson Public School District documentation which is a succinct list of State limits: https://www.jackson.k12.ms.us/cms/lib/MS01910533/Centricity/...

White 8th graders in Mississippi average the same in mathematics testing as white 8th graders in Vermont or New Hampshire. (In reading they're 1 point behind.)

Mississippi's average is only low because they have a large black population, and they do better than black kids in Arkansas, Louisiana, and Alabama, but worse than Tennessee and Georgia.

You can see here:

https://www.nationsreportcard.gov/mathematics/states/groups/...

Mississippi is a poor state, but within Mississippi, do the better performing schools receive more funding?

Positive impact is hard, but there are certainly terrible teachers who have a strong negative impact but are sheltered by teachers' unions. The best case is places like New York that have the notorious "rubber rooms" where they are exiled so at least they can do no further harm to students, while remaining a drain on public finances.

The problem is you can't use data science to find them. Any metric can and will be gamed. It requires a qualitative assessment, and also giving parents more power in the system, since they are the ones most aligned with the interests of students.

Parents more power in the system is a bit of a double edged sword.

For every story about a teacher doing poorly teachers often have them of parents refusing to believe that their child could ever do anything wrong, like cheating or bullying behavior.

But that Japanese experience is not just created by the teachers, the other students and their parents are a very big part of it. I think kids around that age care most about their peers. If they didn't do as everybody else there they would really stand out negatively.

Otherwise, the problem could be solved by importing Japanese teachers to American schools, in person or just their training. I would be surprised if just exchanging for other teachers had a huge impact. That would mean it has always been the teachers fault, which I highly doubt.

I'm not saying that parents don't matter, just that teachers _do_ matter. Both play an important role in setting expectations. Someone with bad parents and bad teachers is likely to have a rough start in life. Having good teachers can give children with bad parents a fighting chance.

Of course, in the US many people strongly in parental control, to the point that you need permission slips to discuss simple facts about the human body or climate change. Sometimes these cultural challenges make it difficult to be a good teacher.

> But that Japanese experience is not just created by the teachers, the other students and their parents are a very big part of it.

As an example of the different overall culture, in Japan kids clean the schools (to varying degrees):

* https://www.npr.org/sections/ed/2015/04/04/396621542/without...

Also, in Japan, teachers move from classroom to classroom, which is different from the US where the kids move between teachers' rooms. And Japanese children help serve (and clean up after) a very nutritious school lunch [0], as opposed to the US which is pinching pennies on feeding children to the point where the tomato paste in pizza is given four times the credit it should be to count as a vegetable.

And education is not without its pitfalls in Japan, like the bullying problem and the high rate of suicide in such a high-pressure environment.

[0]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fze5s1SlqB8

>teachers can play a big role in fostering a positive learning culture.

My spouse is a teacher... I understand it's difficult to maintain a positive attitude and outlook, and therefore a positive learning environment, when more and more paper pushing, busywork, and administrative responsibilities are being pushed onto them. (No, we don't need more [expensive] administrators. [Teacher/Admin] Assistants, perhaps.)

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