The Teaching Machine

I remember the days in a certain school when the staffing levels were such that every year, the school magazine could fit on a single page all the information on who had joined, who had left, who had got married or spawned or suffered a death in the family. One year, I leafed through the latest magazine, only to realise that the information on who had joined and who had left was... missing.

That is when I got curious. So I asked the (ahem) Human Resource Department (which, as my better half reminds me, normally exists to treat humans like resources and not humans). Apparently, that sent up a warning flare, hoisted a red flag, and gained me a black mark. They told me nothing. So I resorted to a very simple method.

I got out the phone extensions list for the previous year. Then I got out the phone extensions list for the current year. And I painstakingly cancelled all the names that appeared on both lists. That is when I realised why all the information was missing. The 'exchange rate' was too high to publish without looking as if the school was becoming a rather unhappy place.

It has often been said (and so far, I've not reliably found a first attribution for it) that teaching is a profession that eats its young. My examination of a certain school also threw up two interesting things: the profession sometimes mummifies and varnishes its older members, and sometimes, it summarily mortifies and vanishes others. According to several studies, the main determining factor as to how a given member is treated is whether that person gets along well with the principal or not.

You see, my dear friends out there who have just become teachers, the key competency is not how well you teach, but how well you get on with the principal. Think about it, and if you ever get to become a principal, try not to use that as a criterion for teacher retention. I say this with forlorn hope, because the studies also show that when people become principals, their value systems are very likely to change so that loyalty and conformity become much more valued traits.

And that, I think, is the best way to explain why school magazines can sometimes reveal things about the teaching machine, and how it works. There's a long and interesting article here, if you're interested. And of course, a careful look at one specific edition of a certain school's magazines will also reveal something a lot like this.

I've always enjoyed taking machines apart to find out what makes them tick. Now, when I do it, people call it 'educational research'. Sometimes, in my more lucid moments, I wonder what kind of research is not educational. Haha.