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Bad Education

By Dylan Matthews - Nov 3rd, 2008 at 2:22 pm

This Harvard Crimson story encapsulates everything that’s wrong with Teach for America:

Four days ago, a select group of eighth graders from G. Gardner Shugart Middle School in Prince George’s County, Maryland, spent all night in a bus on their way up to Harvard.

The long bus ride up the East Coast—which was organized by their social studies teacher, Matthew T. Bosch ’07—was intended to expose the students to college and to enrich their study of American history.

“We want them to know what they need to do if they want to go to college,” said Bosch, who is a former vice-president of the Harvard College Democrats and is currently employed by Teach for America.

The students spent the following day touring the campus, and even had a chance to experience the life of a Harvard student by having lunch in Elliot House [sic], Bosch’s former residence.

Wow - they got to eat in Eliot House (one l, Crimsonites)! How lucky. I’m sure they weren’t upset that they had to go on an all-night bus-ride just so their teacher could brag about his alma mater.

This is what happens when you send people into the classroom based only on their experience at an elite college. There’s all kinds of other, better documented problems with Teach for America–bad teaching due to lack of traditional certification, the uprooting of teachers after only two years–but it’s worth noting the sheer sense of arrogance and entitlement it inculcates. Not only does Bosch feel qualified to teach these kids without going through a regular certification program, he feels like his college background is sufficiently impressive that of course his students would benefit from visiting Cambridge, at age 13 no less.

There’s another way to become a teacher at Harvard. It’s called the Undergraduate Teacher Education Program (UTEP), during which one spends junior and senior year taking education courses and doing student teaching, ending up with a license to teach in Massachusetts public schools. It’s better for students than Teach for America, as its graduates actually have teaching experience before graduating, and they aren’t encouraged to leave after only two years. But it’s better for teachers too. They gain a far better understanding of what is really needed for their students to succeed, and they have enough humility to know that their Harvard A.B. isn’t a magical balm for the underprivileged.

If Harvard students–or any other college students, for that matter–are serious about helping to fix America’s public education system, they ought to do more than a two-year “lets play teacher” summer camp. Maybe then they’ll have a better–and more humble–message for their students than “Trust me, I went to Harvard.”

Tags: education, higher ed, inequality, Teach for America