teacher

This report will seriously unhinge teacher unions. In Canada debate has moved to discussing merit pay for teachers:

Education minister Jeff Johnson got the attention of the Alberta Teachers’ Association when he recently mused about introducing merit pay for Alberta teachers. Predictably, the ATA harshly condemned Johnson’s proposal and vowed to fight any attempt to incorporate merit pay in teacher compensation.

Typical response from unions, more interested in patch protection than excellence.

One of the main arguments the ATA gave for opposing merit pay was that it does not boost student academic achievement. However, there is no evidence that the current salary grid promotes student achievement.

Under the current salary grid, only two factors matter in teacher compensation—years of teaching experience and years of university education. John with six years of university and fifteen years of experience gets paid more than Doris with five years of university and six years of experience. End of story.

It doesn’t matter whether Doris happens to grade more papers, teach better lessons, coach more sports teams, or serve on more committees than John. Even though most people would agree Doris is the better teacher, John is higher on the grid and consequently receives a higher salary. In the ATA’s view, that is exactly how it should be.  Read more »

Both the PPTA and NZEI have new presidents, both women, Angela Roberts and Judith Nowatraski.

Will they be smart enough to realise that the unions have no credibility until they speak out loudly and clearly on every example of teacher accountability such as below.

Two women who accused a male teacher of having sex with them failed in a bid to have their complaint heard in public.

The two former students of the man applied to the Teachers Disciplinary Tribunal in 2011 for a public hearing of their case. They said they’d suffered serious consequences at his hands and a public hearing could force authorities to lay criminal charges.  Read more »

The various teacher unions oppose Charter Schools for many reasons, one of them is that the government legislation as proposed doesn’t require Charter Schools to have mandatory teacher registration like every other school. The unions and the teachers’ Council say this puts kids at risk.

Of course since they started taking this tack in their opposition to Charter Schools I have been cataloguing plenty of teachers, all of them presumably registered as required by law, committing all sorts of crimes from dishonesty offences through to deviant sexual predatory attacks on children…all registered so the kids could be safe.

A foreign exchange trader is alleged to have stolen more than $837,000 from investors – including family and friends.

Rene Alan Chalmers, a 42-year-old teacher from Pukekohe, appeared at the Auckland District Court today to face 15 charges including theft by a person in a special relationship and making false statements to investors.

The charges relate to him trading in foreign money and allegedly misleading investors.  Read more »

I am highly critical of the Herald but today they have done something of a public service in highlighting the draconian secrecy provisions of the Teachers’ Council disciplinary proceedings. Secrecy that allows criminal teachers to escape wider censure.

A physical education teacher at a Christian school has admitted to an inappropriate relationship with a 17-year-old student – one of 11 teachers found guilty of serious misconduct last year whose actions have been permanently suppressed.

The New Zealand Teachers Council has posted a warning advising the public and media it is illegal to publish details of disciplinary proceedings.

The warning is based on a little-known blanket suppression rule that has never been enforced, and is more draconian than the rules used by the criminal courts and most disciplinary bodies.

The Teachers Council Disciplinary Tribunal has suspended the PE teacher’s practising certificate for three years, and has ordered him to tell prospective employers of the offence if he returns to teaching.

However because of the new warning we can’t report his name. Nor can we report his school. Strictly speaking, the Herald on Sunday shouldn’t be reporting the misconduct and suspension at all.

Teachers Council (Conduct) Rule 32(1), set in place under statute in 2004, means nobody may publish any details of a tribunal decision. That means any reports you’ve read in newspapers or seen on television are against the law.  Read more »

Teachers are committing more and more crimes and in Otago at least their offending rates are at a 20 year high.

Still, the kids will be safe because they are all registered:

Violence, careless driving causing death or injury, excess blood-alcohol while driving, and driving while impaired have left 11 teachers with criminal convictions in Otago during 2012 – the highest number for more than 20 years.

The previous high was in 2010 when eight teachers received convictions on pornography, dishonesty or alcohol and drug charges.

Since 1992, 46 Otago teachers received convictions for crimes covering dangerous driving causing death or injury, drugs, alcohol, violence, pornography and sexual offending.  Read more »

The various teacher unions all oppose Charter Schools, mainly on the basis that the government isn’t going to require compulsory registration of teachers at charter schools. Their rationale is that this will put kids in harm’s way.

Meanwhile this registered teacher has plead guilty to taking upskirt photos of pupils and other girls:

A Canterbury school teacher has admitted using a pen camera to film up the skirts of 17 girls at his work, shopping malls, and at home.

The middle-aged man, who has name suppression, will be sentenced in April after he pleaded guilty to making 20 secret intimate recordings.

Read more »

We started our Saturday by paying our respects to Norman Schwarzkopf Jr., the hard-charging US Army general whose forces smashed the Iraqi army in the 1991 Gulf War.  He died aged 78.  At The Standard 2012 Worst Political Blog Mike Smith is told some home truths about long term grass-roots Labour families heading for the Greens.  A quick vid on how to put out a boat fire the Kiwi way is next, followed by a vote for Best Minister.  The winner, at 52%, is Judith Collins.  The Whale Week That Was summarised all the stories this blog covered in the previous seven days.  A quite active Saturday Debate (for the time of year especially) led a post calling for nominations for Best Political Blog.  Those who see WOBH as any sort of threat to them (and those that don’t too), should take heed of this Malcolm Tucker quote: “marshal all the media forces of Darkness to hound them to an assisted suicide”.  A CNN piece showing Teachers in Utah taking a class on gun use shows some common sense around the gun debate.  A reader has taken yesterday’s US Fiscal Cliff graphic and created one for New Zealand – great work.  As Cameron Slater predicted from the outset, the Aussie Hoax DJs will not face charges.  The NZ Herald continues to amuse – this time a car crashed into a poll.  The blog then introduces us to two sexy taxidermists showing you don’t have to look like a front row forward to deal with dead animals.  And you’d think we’re picking on an incompetent NZ Herald, and you would be right.  This time they have Jesse Ryder beating himself at Eden Park in Wellington.  Then a hilarious story about a Queensland woman who fell into the longdrop and was there for two hours before being discovered by her husband.   Turns out that during the Falklands War the French tried to send missiles to Argentinia behind Margaret Thatcher‘s back.  Commerce first eh?  The last post of the day highlights a report of a man holding up a Countdown Supermarket with a hammer.  Our readers get fired up about the idea of hammer banning.

Read more »

Don’t you just love teachers and their governing body. Check out the stats from the Teachers’ Council.

Hitting a pupil with a chair, grooming a young girl for sex and a $60,000 benefit fraud were among the charges that saw teachers struck off this year.

Others, including one who arranged for a gang hit on a principal, were censured for serious misconduct and had strict conditions put on their practising licences.

Statistics released under the Official Information Act show nine male and six female teachers had their registration with the Teachers Council cancelled this year. Registration certifies that a teacher is trained, qualified and suitable to be a teacher, and is compulsory in all state schools.

Compulsory registration is working so well, and consistently isn’t it?  Read more »

The blog started Saturday by having a look at a number of Christchurch people taking pictures up women’s skirts at malls.  And wouldn’t you know it?  A teacher was arrested as well.  Iain Lees-Galloway shows he is a slimy git by opening a Burger King and then refusing to take a bite, preferring to preach sensible food choices.  Cam then called for nominations for Worst Political Journalist, and Barry Soper and John Campbell appeared hot favourites.   Next we had a vote on Best Political Journalist, which Larry Williams took out with a massive 47% of the vote.  Graham McCready withdrew litigation against John Banks because it made no sense to anyone – as in – they couldn’t understand what it said.  Whale then claims a win on his Hekia Parata predictions and wonders why Key has let this train wreck happen.  We raise our eyebrows about Nelson looking for a scooter riding bottom pincher and then watch a video of what happens to a pig at the bottom of the sea over 7 days.  Next a post where Greens are fighting Greens over the Google solar plant.  On the one side: solar energy.  On the other? Turtles.   Charles Krauthammer explains why gun control alone isn’t the solution to mass shootings.   A MENSA spokesperson calls people with low IQs carrots and the BBC feels they have to apologise.  There is a property for sale next to Kim Dotcom‘s place.  Cam suggests the GCSB or the US should have bought it to set up spying operations.   WOBH is calling for The Whale Army to send in their holiday snaps, in a new feature called Snapped!  Cam takes a brief look at who will enter parliament if Tim Groser leaves for the WTO.  To close the day, a WhaleTech post looks at a the cull-de-sac that’s the QII roll-up keyboard. Read more »