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@icyfroth wrote:

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@polksaladallie wrote:

The bad teachers can't be sacked just to make way for a good teacher.  There was a shortage years ago, so anyone was given a position.

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Do you even wonder why there's a shortage of teachers, Polks?

From the OP:

 

"The Sunday Telegraph has been inundated with letters from teachers and concerned parents on the issue of discipline, while a recent survey found the lack of control in the classroom was among the key reasons many staff quit the education system."

 

So there's a bit more to it than bad teachers vs good teachers. In your opinion which are the 'bad' teachers and which are the "good" teachers?

 

Are the bad teachers the "anyones" that are given a position because the good teachers have quit or been dismissed and gone on to other lines of work, Like Mr Krix?

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Icy

    I swear I am not stalking you.  However, I find myself compelled to respond to your posts.

I agree that the critical question here is who are the good teachers and who are the bad teachers.  I have read many of your posts and I believe your argument is as follows:

• There are good students and bad students
• Bad students are students who have no interest in learning and no respect for authority
• Further, bad students are disruptive in that they set a bad example for good students and interrupt the lessons
• That is, bad students prevent good students from learning
• Physically disciplining bad students would have the effect of minimising disruption of the lesson and facilitate a better learning outcome for the good students
• A good teacher is one that attempts to maximise the learning outcomes in his or her lessons
• Therefore a good teacher is one that will take whatever steps necessary to minimise disruptions to his or her lessons, such steps including the physical disciple of bad students

If that is your argument I agree that it is internally consistent and would probably have the desired outcome. However, the problem here is not the students or the teachers but the parents.  Some parents will agree that little Johnny is an unholy terror and firm steps need to be taken to avoid disruption in the classroom.  However, not all parents are as open minded when it comes to their own children.  They might agree that other children need to be punished.  But I think most parents would be outraged if they found that their own children were being physically restrained or beaten by their teachers.  And they would take steps to prevent such abuses of their child and such steps would be very detrimental to the school.

Even if it was only a minority of parents who felt this way that minority would be sufficient such that the school would feel compelled to implement a no child beating policy.  

So the good teacher bad teacher question, to me, is not as simple as which teacher is the better educator.  In the context of teaching as an employee school teacher, one must factor into the equation whether the teacher is a good employee or a bad employee.  As I have previously stated, an employee is a bad employee if he or she does not follow an employers instructions such that he or she leaves the employer open to legal sanctions. 

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@aftanas wrote:

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icyfroth wrote: (quoting from the article)

 

Disciplining disputes have also landed many teachers in court, such as in the case of former high school teacher Stephen Krix, who was sacked after putting an unruly student into a headlock.

 

The court found that Mr Krix was right to direct misbehaving boys to stay in his classroom, but not to "physically restrain" them.

 

 Link To Article

 

It's about time they woke up to themselves. I'd love to see Mr Krix re-instated.

 

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Again, sloppy journalism that drives me crazy.  The article implies that Mr Krix was charged with an offense or was sued and was required to defend his actions in a court.  However, the disciplinary action did not land Mr Krix in court.  The Krix case was heard before the Industrial Relations Commission which is not a court.  It is an administrative body exercising powers conferred to it under the Industrial Relations Act 1996 NSW.  (Except when is sits as the Commission in Court Session which wasn't the case here.)  And Mr Krix landed himself before the Industrial Relations Commission when he appealed the dismissal.

This is another beat up peddling incorrect information to serve an editorial end.  The editorial end here is to depict teenagers as bad and teachers as good and the administrators of the education system as clueless.  These stories create controversy which is good for business, but it does little to facilitate an informed debate.

Mr Krix and a whole bunch of other teachers have been sanctioned for failing to adhere to their emloyer's policy in respect to disciplining students.  Specifically, the rules which provides teachers may not hit or touch students, may not demean them and may not deprive their students of their property. 

Posters on this forum seem to fall into two schools:

• those who consider teachers should be permitted to physically punish students (and therefore the teachers have done no wrong); and
• those who consider teachers should follow the rules set by their employers (and therefore are rightly sanctioned if they have contravened those rules)

If we wish to have an informed debate on this subject I think we should take a moment to consider why the rules exist: that is, the rules that teachers may not hit or touch students or otherwise humiliate or upset them.

The first point is that teachers are not vigilantes dispensing education as they see fit.  They are employees of the NSW Dept of Education. Given the legal relationship between an employer and employee, the Dept of Education is legally responsible for the acts of its teacher where those teachers are acting in the performance of their employment duties.

The second point to note is that all large organisations are bureaucratic in nature, and one of the characteristics of bureaucratic organisations is risk aversion.  That is, bureaucracies will institute policies that minimise harm to the organisation and these policies will take precedence over policies implemented to further the ostensible objectives of the organisation. 

Given the above two points it is clear that an organisation employing teachers will institute policies such that the teachers are not permitted to act in a manner that will lead to criticism of the organisation, or that may result in the organisation being sued for negligence.

It has been argued that beating on students makes them smarter.  Or makes the other students smarter.  Whether that is true or not, many parents do not agree that their children should be beaten by teachers.  Some parents have been known to get litigious when their children come home with bruises and ripped clothing caused by scuffles with their teachers.  So teaching organisations, having a duty of care in relation to the students and being risk averse, institute rules that prevent teachers from fighting with their students.  This takes the organisation out of the litigation equation.  Culpability for the organisation only arises where they do not have the appropriate policies in place.  (It should be pointed out here that, while schools also have an obligation to teach their students, no suit alleging a breach of this obligation would be successful, providing the the school had a structured curriculum and employed qualified teachers.)

To me the question about Mr Krix's dismissal is quite simple:

• as an employee is Mr Krix obligated to execute his employment duties in a manner dictated by his employer
• if Mr Krix consistently refuses to carry out his employment duties in such a manner, is his employer entitled to terminate his employment
  

To me the answer is also quite simple.  (It's yes.)

I agree that there is a higher question here.  That question is whether a better teaching result will arise if bad students are beaten or physically restrained.  Or if they are isolated from the good students.  To me that is a different debate. 

Thirty or fourty years ago, every day kids were blowing themselves up with crackers or petrol bombs or driving their bicycles under ice cream trucks.  Almost every child I went to school with had at least one broken limb or third degree burn.  Parents didn't differentiate between freelance accidents or accidents at school.  Workplace accidents fell into the same category of "just blind bad luck".

It is a different world now.  Employers are responsible for the safety of their employees and schools are responsible for the well-being of their students. In the current environment, the Dept of Education leaves itself open to legal sanctions if it does not actively prevent teachers from harming students or allowing students to come to harm.  

So the question of Mr Krix allowing himself to become involved in a scuffle with a student calls into question his commitment to abide by the terms of his employment contract.  In his particular circumstances it was found that he had no such commitment and so he was dismissed.  Looking at it from the Dept's point of view, it would have been negligent of the Dept to have made any other decision.

 

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You use the word "beaten" a lot. Its been a few weeks since I read throught this thread and I dont have time to go back over all of it now, but I dont recall any posters approving of "beating" the children. Physically restaining a child is not beating.

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@aftanas wrote:

So the good teacher bad teacher question, to me, is not as simple as which teacher is the better educator.  In the context of teaching as an employee school teacher, one must factor into the equation whether the teacher is a good employee or a bad employee.  As I have previously stated, an employee is a bad employee if he or she does not follow an employers instructions such that he or she leaves the employer open to legal sanctions. 

  

 

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So really some "good educators" can be dismissed as "bad employees" because they simply cannot combine maintaining an orderly classroom with challenging students under the rigid restrictions asl laid down by the education board. So they simply give up and move on.

From the OP:

"Since the abolition of the cane in the 1990s, teachers have also been banned from "shouting angrily" or physically stopping students from leaving a classroom.

The existing code of conduct states teachers are not ­allowed to confiscate items such as mobile phones, but ­instead must "ask" the student to hand over  the item."

"...a recent survey found the lack of control in the classroom was among the key reasons many staff quit the education system."

So the Dept of Education is finally waking up to the fact that it's losing some of their best teaching staff because of it's inflexible code of conduct and is now reviewing it.

About bleeping time.

"The move is likely to be welcomed by teachers, who claim their powers to control misbehaving students have been eroded by rigid regulations."

Seriously, I can't see Mr Krix ever being reinstated, but it's good to see his case as a groundbreaker for the review.

There is no way I would take on a room full of teenagers as things stand at the moment.

It has been a very stupid move taking control away from teachers AND PARENTS.  It has brought about a generation (or two) of kids who have little idea of how to behave, have no manners and who think they can do as they like.

I have raised 8 kids all up and believe me, to have ignored their bad behaviour would have turned them into monsters...

All children can be monsters without the proper love and control they need to fit into society and, from my point of view, this starts with parents and teachers having legal control to get the messages through to them.

Of course violence from either party is not to be accepted, but we aren't talking violence here, we are talking control, which is necessary if we are going to have reasonable adults in the future.

Time the Education Department and the Government woke up to this before it's the unruly teens of today that take over the departsments tomorrow.

No one has taken away the control from parents. If we need regulations that prevent people from physical abuse of children, then it's a good thing.

What I believe is needed is more parenting courses and more expectations of good behaviour from both adults and children.

What I see regularly is the lack of respect some people have for themselves and others.