The County School Boards create a costly, ineffective organization.  They keep raising the millage rate and requiring the citizens to pay more and more for an organization the is not cost effective.

The National Socialists have 2 solutions to the low quality of education, and the expensive education our children are receiving: (1) give more money to the organization that is producing the inadequate product and (2) for untrained, taxpayer-supported, National Socialists to exercise more control.  All that smaller classroom size does is put more teachers on the payroll.  I have heard that Einstein said insanity was doing the same thing and expecting different results.

Taking more money from wealth producers and giving it to an organization that is not cost-effective is not a solution.

You must define the problem before you can solve the problem.  What are the independent variables?  How do we measure the independent variables?  What is the dependent variable?  How do we measure the dependent variable?  The change in which independent variable produces the largest change in the dependent variable?  Which is the most cost-effective independent variable to change?

Problems can seldom be solved by pedestrian thinkers.  Years ago, people opened their windows so they could enjoy the cool of the evening.  Some people got malaria.  Pedestrian thinkers came to the conclusion that night air caused malaria.

The learning environment has 4 people components: (1) the pay (2) the knowledge of how to facilitate learning, (3) the knowledge of the subject to be taught, (4) the subject matter that will be taught.  (There are some minor components that are physical: buildings, desks, etc.)

(1) I propose that we pass a state law forbidding anyone in the school system from being paid more than a teacher is paid.

Visualize this: the time is early America.  We have just arrived from England.  We came over as indentured slaves with General Oglethorpe and we are going to establish a colony named Georgia - we name our colony in honor of the king.  We have 25 children of various ages.  We need a school, so we hire one teacher.   That teacher will teach all of the grades.  As the number of children increases, that one teacher needs help.  At no point in our growth will that teacher need help that is paid more than he/she is paid. [A] We do not help the students to learn by hiring someone who is paid more than the teacher. [B] The teacher does not need that kind of help.  No job in the school system is worth more than the job of teacher.  The essence of a school is the teacher and the students.  Administrative personnel support the teacher.  It is not cost-effective to pay more for the support than you do for the teacher.

We pay some non-teacher employees of the school system (superintendent, etc.) more than we pay a teacher and then we wonder why the focus of the employees is not on teaching.  People leave teaching to become non-teachers because non-teachers make more money.   Some very non-Mensa grade arguments are made for the obscene salaries of administrators.   "We need high salaries to get good people" - you just promote a teacher who was already working for less.  (You are rationalizing not reasoning).  If there is a teacher who wants to do administrative work, then just shift her to the administrative work - we will not reduce her salary (maybe a token amount, just to let her know she is no longer working in the most valued job).  We do not require IQ tests for administrative jobs so we are not selecting the most intelligent person for the job.

As a start, let's create two pay scales - one for administration and one for teachers.  The essence of a computer software firm is the programmer.  The essence of the school is the teacher.  SAP, an international computer software firm, has two pay scales - one for administration and one for programmers.  When we do this, we remove the rationalizing that bureaucrats do to "justify" their elevated salaries.  An administrator does not "supervises" a nuclear physics professor.

(2) I  propose that teachers earn a Masters Degree in the Science of Learning.  Included in the degree curriculum with be the course entitled "Psychological Measurement and Test Development".  There will be courses in Programmed Instruction.  They will learn about Response and Reinforcement. They will learn about Positive and Negative Reinforcement.  They will learn about Objective Tests.  They will learn about reliability coefficients and validity coefficients.  They will learn about how the length of the learning session affects learning.   They will learn about how the length of time between response and reinforcement affects learning.  They will learn about how the frequency of  testing affects learning.  And many similar things.

(3) I propose that teachers have, or get, a college degree with a major in the subject that they teach.
 
(4) What to teach?  Do we teach about the Mayflower Compact?  Do we teach about the Puritans? Logic decrees that if in the beginning there was nothing, there would be nothing now.  Do we ignore logic and teach that the Universe just came into existence?   Do we teach that an amazing, beautiful, complicated, creature like the humming bird, just happened?  There are no enough billions of years for circumstances to create that bird.  At the same time circumstances were creating the giraffe, elephant, and thousands of other marvelous animals and plants.  Or do we teach that an awesome God created a mind-boggling universe?   Do we indoctrinate our young with the idea that they evolved from a lower animal, and then wring our hands when they act like lower-animals and kill each other?   Many branches of science were founded by Christians (see book "Men of Science, Men of Faith").  Do we cover up this fact, and brainwash ignorant people with the matra "Christianity and science are incompatible"?  Do we use our valuable time teaching math, or do we waste our time talking about "diversity"?  The citizens, through the School Board, decide
these issues.

Vouchers.  Is there any benefit from having a voucher system?  There surely is - competition.

Consider the minimum GRE score needed to participate in the M.B.A. program at Kinnesaw State University in 1997.  The national average score of the education majors was 3.7% higher than that score.  These M.B.A.'s are running the system that produces our goods and service.   People who are business majors do as well as they do, despite their lower GRE scores, because of competition.  To the extent that GRE score corresponds to IQ, this means that people who are education majors can run a competent education system that produces qualified graduates if they are forced to because of competition, the same thing that forces business majors to run competent organizations.