EDUCATON(sic) Why Birmingham city schools hired Filipino teachers (Birmingham News AL)

[jody]

EDUCATON: Why Birmingham city schools hired Filipino teachers
By BARBARA S. ALLEN interim superintendent of Birmingham City Schools.

I understand why board members, and even a July 20 Birmingham News editorial (here), have raised questions about hiring teachers from overseas. I firmly believe it was in our students' best interest to place carefully selected Filipino teachers in classrooms rather than to have substitutes for months instead. In fact, a number of math and science positions remained unfilled the entire 2008-09 school year.

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There simply are not sufficient numbers of students majoring in math and science education to provide schools with the teachers they need. A nationwide shortage exists, and districts all over the nation have hired teachers from the Philippines, India and other countries. Alabama allows districts to hire people who have degrees in subject areas, but those teachers must take college courses and meet content testing requirements in order to remain in the classroom.

Critics have questioned why, with unemployment at the highest level in decades, we cannot fill all of our teacher positions with people from the Birmingham area or, at least, from neighboring states. Only those who have sufficient coursework in math and science can even be considered for math and science positions, leaving the majority of people who have lost their jobs without the necessary qualifications. Our human resources personnel say that only a small percentage of applicants without education degrees qualify.

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The Filipino teachers received H-1B visas, which are nonimmigrant visas that allow them to work in the U.S. for three years and can be extended up to six years total and, in some cases, beyond six years. It is true the district could be required to pay for return transportation costs if we terminate any of the teachers before the end of three years, but nationally, that has happened rarely because teachers generally find other districts to hire them instead of returning to their homelands.

Despite Allen’s explanation, Alabamians are not convinced her decision to in-source teachers is sound.

This incident is part of the overall unemployment situation for people with special skills including IT, engineering, science.

It’s difficult to convince blue/grey collar parents who helped their children through college to see their dreams come through for a professional career, that employers whether private or government are not hiring foreign professionals just to keep costs very low.

I also am not persuaded by Allen's assertions.

[izquierdista]

1. Education degrees

I wonder how the world was able to progress before education degrees. I wonder how Shakespeare learned to write, how Newton learned algebra, and how Lincoln learned to argue the law.

On edit: Oops, my bad, educaton degrees.

[BlooInBloo]

10. "Educaton" degrees are the death of intellect.

[dsc]

16. actually if you bothered to read the post

it would have been clear the problem was not that the applicants lacked education courses, it was that they LACKED MATH AND SCIENCE COURSES. While I do think their main problem is an unwillingness to raise wages to those of places like Georgia and North Carolina and not that there are no Americans with the qualifications, it isn't a lack of education courses as made crystal clear in the post.

[Edweird]

2. I recall , when I lost everything, DU'ers admonishing me that "you should have been a teacher

like me" because "I PAID MY DUES, and now everything is just fine" (like I haven't paid mine?) and generally being an ass. Blue collar workers here get the shaft. Nobody cares when OUR jobs are undercut by cheap foreign labor. Well, now it's your turn. And while I never want to kick anyone when they are down, in this case I'll make an exception. They are coming for your jobs. You're gonna get fucked just like I did. I can't wait to call anyone that protests this a 'racist' and 'xenophobe', just like I was when I pointed out how cheap construction labor was killing us. And I'll be sure to point out how it's ALL YOUR FAULT because YOU CHOSE to be a teacher. Or IT professional. (For the record I went to school for Computer Engineering and got hired while I was in school. I realized quickly that, while I love computers, I hate working with assholes. I am not 'uneducated'.)

So eat it and smile.

[jody]

3. Many of my friends express similar sentiments. n/t

[proud2BlibKansan]

9. Well I wasn't one of those teachers here

And I find your post appalling and insensitive.

[liberalhistorian]

11. Nice broad brush there, pal. I understand your anger and

bitterness, believe me, and there is, indeed, some truth to what you're saying. But you're talking about a minority of teachers. My parents are retired teachers, as are most of their friends and many of the rest of my family, and they were and are very strong supporters of blue-collar workers and strongly against outsourcing of any kind. Hell, most of them, parents included, came from blue-collar backgrounds. They were and are appalled at those teachers and education officials who feel the way you're talking about and continue to speak out against that. I find your broad brush very offensive.

[juno jones]

12. Hear, hear.

Blue-collar doesn't mean uneducated. Some people might want to remember that before being rude.

[proud2BlibKansan]

13. Well until someone posts a link to those rude posts

I am going to assume this is make believe bullshit. :)

[sammytko]

4. keeping costs low - don't they pay according to a state schedule?

wouldn't the other math and science teachers make the same amount? i just think no one wants to work in Birmingham.

My math instructor said that his daughter - a math teacher - was not going to receive a bonus because the field was saturated. This is in San antonio texas. We have elementary school teachers unable to find jobs and the only stipends are for bilingual and special ed.

[jody]

6. I've heard similar stories and that's why I'm not persuaded by Allen's statement. n/t

[enlightenment]

5. She's parsing words.

Only those who have sufficient coursework in math and science can even be considered for math and science positions, leaving the majority of people who have lost their jobs without the necessary qualifications. Our human resources personnel say that only a small percentage of applicants without education degrees qualify.

It isn't that the applicants are deficient in math and science coursework - or, probably, even higher ed degrees - it's that Alabama, like most states, requires teachers to take courses (or have a specific degree) in education, which teaches pedagogy: "how to teach math" "how to teach science" "how to control your classroom". They use fancier titles for the classes, of course.

Pedagogy is not a bad thing; it is helpful to know how to develop a lesson plan and classroom management and the like, but when it becomes more important than content knowledge it does nothing for children or the education system as a whole. Telling a person who has been working in the sciences or using maths - who might have not just a BS, but a higher degree - that they're not qualified to teach because they haven't got education degrees is taking stupid to the n'th degree. Yet states do it every single day, without offering viable alternatives to people who are offering to fill the places they desperately need filled.

It is true that not everyone can teach, but pedagogy can't turn those people into teachers - as we have all experienced at one time in our lives. Requiring an individual who has content knowledge, a degree in that content knowledge, and experience using it to take another year or two of courses "learning" how to teach before they can be licensed drives a lot of qualified and probably talented potential teachers away.

In my state, if you want to teach in the public schools you have to have one course (state school law - that one makes sense to require) before you start. Then you may be hired, provisionally, if you have subject content qualifications (a degree in the field, usually). You have two years to complete the required course work in 'education' - the same number of courses a student taking a BA in ed would take (minus the general ed and subject area courses). Your background doesn't matter, nor does the level of your education to point. For instance, if I wanted to teach high school, I'd have to fulfill those requirements - despite the fact that I have been teaching at the college level for almost 10 years. I would even (I particularly love this one) have to TAKE a course I currently TEACH. I know. I asked.

nuts.


edited to correct spelling

[jody]

7. I know one person with a PhD in Philosophy from an Ivy League school and an AL teaching certificate

who is unable to get a position in Alabama. He is certified to teach math and science.

:shrug:

[JackDragna]

8. I'll defend the person here at least a little..

..I'm a science teacher and I've personally seen the shortages of people of my background in public schools. I still get occasional emailings and letters from schools I talked to when I was first looking for work, asking me to go there, promising the world. My own school seems to constantly go through a new batch of math/science teachers every year. Granted, I sometimes think the requirements to be a math/science teacher, particularly if one is going to teach middle school kids, are silly on a state level, but schools have to try to work within the requirements.

[izquierdista]

17. Working within the requirements

When the requirements are to build your aquarium with half-inch wire mesh, only the stupid follow those requirements and wonder why all the water ran out.

[proud2BlibKansan]

14. My district did this

I don't believe many of the foreign teachers were here more than a year or so.

[surrealAmerican]

15. I'm confused.

Wouldn't the foreign teachers have to meet the the same requirements as current US residents? Is there some sort of glut of well-qualified math and science teachers in the Philippines?

[OhioChick]

18. What a bunch of BS...

I know of many teachers who have been laid off and can't find a job....and they're all willing to relocate. Once again, it's all about who will do the job.....the cheapest.