In today’s Wall Street Journal legendary NFL quarterback Fran Tarkenton shares his perspectives on what the NFL would be like of the players lived under the same rules as America’s public school teachers. In his article Mr. Tarkenton who is now an entrepreneur and runs two websites that are dedicated to educating small business makes the following observations.
Each player’s salary would be based on how long they had played in the league. Talent would not matter.
Any player that stayed on a roster for 3 years would be granted tenure and could stay on the team indefinitely.
The on field product would decline.
Here are some interesting excerpts from the article:
“The only difference between Tom Brady and the worst player in the league is a few years of step increases.”
“Teachers’ salaries have no relation to whether teachers are actually good at their job—excellence isn’t rewarded, and neither is extra effort. Pay is almost solely determined by how many years they’ve been teaching.”
“Inflation-adjusted spending per student in the United States has nearly tripled since 1970.”
“Over the past 20 years, we’ve been told that a big part of the problem is crumbling schools—that with new buildings and computers in every classroom, everything would improve. But even though spending on facilities and equipment has more than doubled since 1989 (again adjusted for inflation), we’re still not seeing results, and officials assume the answer is that we haven’t spent enough.”
“These same misguided beliefs are front and center in President Obama’s jobs plan, which includes billions for “public school modernization.” The popular definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over, expecting different results.”
“Some reformers, including Bill Gates, are finally catching on that our federally centralized, union-created system provides no incentive for better performance. If anything, it penalizes those who work hard because they spend time, energy and their own money to help students, only to get the same check each month as the worst teacher in the district (or an even smaller one, if that teacher has been there longer).”
“Perhaps no other sector of American society so demonstrates the failure of government spending and interference. We’ve destroyed individual initiative, individual innovation and personal achievement, and marginalized anyone willing to point it out. As one of my coaches used to say, “You don’t get vast results with half-vast efforts!”
“Our rigid, top-down, union-dictated system isn’t working. If results are the objective, then we need to loosen the reins, giving teachers the ability to fulfill their responsibilities to students to the best of their abilities, not to the letter of the union contract and federal standards.”
Link to full article:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204226204576601232986845102.html?KEYWORDS=tarkenton
