Zeros benefit lazy teachers

Allowing zeros for missed assignments has three results. It encourages teachers to take the easy road, lets those teachers hurt students with impunity, and cheats Albertans out of the benefit of the billions they contribute to education.

Good teachers have always had a “no-zero” policy. Great teachers encourage students to do their best, hound them for assignments, phone home, extend deadlines, stay late to give extra help, and do everything they can to ensure kids are taught what they need to know. They do this because it is their job.

Unfortunately, some teachers choose the easy route: assign zeros and, voila, their work is done. They don’t have to phone home. They don’t have to stay after school to help a student. The teacher collects an easy paycheque, the student fails, and another uneducated citizen is on the streets of Alberta.

I’ve heard Albertans praise this teaching style, saying “in the real world, that kid would be fired.”

In the real world of the modern Alberta classroom, students are hungry. They have drug-addicted parents and are often experimenting with drugs themselves. They hold full-time jobs to pay for basics. They are on the streets with no adult in their lives to care one way or the other.

This isn’t the work world. We are talking about children who need a teacher’s commitment to their education for them to have a decent future. That people support this lazy, unprofessional approach to education leaves me disappointed in the common sense and decency of Albertans.