[Newsbot]

Title: Edmonton teacher suspended for giving 0s
Category: Misc CDN
Posted By: Strutz
Date: 2012-05-31 14:32:56
Canadian

[DrCaleb]

Heard about this on my way in this morning. Pitiful. You can't reward someone for doing nothing. If they do nothing, in the real world you don't "reward ability". You reward accomplishment. If you don't do the work (even after many opportunities to hand it in) you get no reward. If I don't show up for work, I don't get partial pay, I get zero. Anything less is not being fair to the kids.

[martin14]

DrCaleb DrCaleb:

Heard about this on my way in this morning. Pitiful. You can't reward someone for doing nothing. If they do nothing, in the real world you don't "reward ability". You reward accomplishment. If you don't do the work (even after many opportunities to hand it in) you get no reward. If I don't show up for work, I don't get partial pay, I get zero. Anything less is not being fair to the kids.

Agreed, this policy is a real joke, and who winds up getting really screwed are the kids.
They are learning the 100% wrong way about how things work.

I am happy I got out of school before they started doing truly stupid shit like this.


Kudos to Mr. Dorval..


Can the good people of Edmonton please stand up and demand this teacher be reinstated ?

Better yet, put him in charge of the Public School System.

[Brenda]

$1:

"no-zero" policy.

The thinking behind the policy is that failing to complete assignments is a behavioural issue and marks should reflect ability, not behaviour.

So if I, to the best to my ability, answer only 1 question (out of 56 or something), not even bothering to do the rest, I get an A?

[CDN_PATRIOT]

That policy is a complete joke. Kids can now slack their way through school and get a pat on the back for being average. The teacher did the right thing. You don't complete an assignment, you get a big fat '0', as it should be, and was back when I was in school.

-J.

[Guy_Fawkes]

The idea behind it (from what I remember going to an Edmonton school) was that the min mark you could ever get is 35%. That meant, if you fuck up on one or two assignments your average would be higher than if you got a zero. The problem is youths are given way too many chances these days to slide by on the good graces of teachers who hate to feel all their hard work is for naught. What it is really doing is setting kids up for failure thinking that they can half ass their way through life and end up with a high paying job.

[QBall]

$1:

"It's what they call social promotion," Dorval said "It's a way of pushing kids through even though they're not actually doing the work. It's a way of getting them through, getting their credits and of course making the staff look very good."

Hope I never get operated on by a surgeon who went through "social promotion".

[westmanguy]

Yeppp. No shockers here. I'm 3 years post-high school and I remember in my last year Manitoba brought in the 'no lates penalty' policy. Many teachers, like Dorval, would let you hand in an assignment late for partial marks - up to a certain timeline - but you had a penalty.

It made sense and it was fair. There is deadlines for a reason. It was like 1% each school day it was late tacked off.

That's how it works at university for sure! I lose something like 2% everyday (not school day) its not handed in.

Now, in Manitoba, an assignment due in Sept *must* be accepted by a teacher even if its handed in June and marked with no penalties. So bam, a good putting in zilch for effort, realizing they're failing can do the assignment last minute and get enough in too pass.

The schools are pushing through so many kids to graduation who should never have graduated.

I finished with a 94% average in Gr. 12 and felt dutifully unprepared for university. 80% feels great to me in uni now and I'm happy with a 76%.

[bootlegga]

A kid from Ross Sheppard (the school which suspend Mr. Dorval) called in the radio today and said it's even worse than that - if you don't answer questions on tests, they can't score a zero on that either! So if you answer only a couple questions perfectly out of a dozen, you can get a 100%!

Seriously? We are doing kids a disservice by instituting policies like this.

These kids are going to get a rude awakening when they hit Grade 12 and write the Diploma exams (province-wide exams worth 50% of their final grade), because the province doesn't let kids get away with BS like this. Same goes for university - they are going to be seriously under-equipped to deal with university level courses which offer no such leniency.

[PublicAnimalNo9]

bootlegga bootlegga:

A kid from Ross Sheppard (the school which suspend Mr. Dorval) called in the radio today and said it's even worse than that - if you don't answer questions on tests, they can't score a zero on that either! So if you answer only a couple questions perfectly out of a dozen, you can get a 100%!

Seriously? We are doing kids a disservice by instituting policies like this.

These kids are going to get a rude awakening when they hit Grade 12 and write the Diploma exams (province-wide exams worth 50% of their final grade), because the province doesn't let kids get away with BS like this.

Correct me if I'm wrong but doesn't the province set the educational standards?

[SprCForr]

Yes it does, but no one actually checks.

[DrCaleb]

PublicAnimalNo9 PublicAnimalNo9:

bootlegga bootlegga:

A kid from Ross Sheppard (the school which suspend Mr. Dorval) called in the radio today and said it's even worse than that - if you don't answer questions on tests, they can't score a zero on that either! So if you answer only a couple questions perfectly out of a dozen, you can get a 100%!

Seriously? We are doing kids a disservice by instituting policies like this.

These kids are going to get a rude awakening when they hit Grade 12 and write the Diploma exams (province-wide exams worth 50% of their final grade), because the province doesn't let kids get away with BS like this.

Correct me if I'm wrong but doesn't the province set the educational standards?

They do, but only insofar as to say what the students need to learn, not how the teachers are to grade them. That is left to individual school boards.

Places like Ontario and Texas already tried this 'no zero' policy and now it's illegal there to implement it. No work = 0 score.

I heard the board superintendent trying to justify this policy. It has to be one of the silliest interviews I've heard so far. Check it out:

The Teacher (yesterday):
http://www.cbc.ca/edmontonam/episodes/2 ... os-policy/

The Superintendent:
http://www.cbc.ca/edmontonam/episodes/2 ... rk-policy/

[PublicAnimalNo9]

$1:

He shouldn't even be teaching anymore. If he wants to hand out zeros, he should be doing some other job — not a teacher."

—Ryan Grouette, Grade 10

Maybe if he spent less time fucking around on his stupid fucking iPhone and more time paying attention in class, zeroes wouldn't be an issue for this little cry-baby.

$1:

"If students show up they deserve a minimum mark. A zero seems a bit extreme."

—Cindy Smith, Grade 11

Little Ms.Smith better hope she gets a job with a strong union, otherwise, she's gonna find out you don't get paid just to show up.

[DrCaleb]

PublicAnimalNo9 PublicAnimalNo9:

$1:

"If students show up they deserve a minimum mark. A zero seems a bit extreme."

—Cindy Smith, Grade 11

Little Ms.Smith better hope she gets a job with a strong union, otherwise, she's gonna find out you don't get paid just to show up.

Outside of Greece, anyway.

[BartSimpson]

Guy_Fawkes Guy_Fawkes:

The idea behind it (from what I remember going to an Edmonton school) was that the min mark you could ever get is 35%. That meant, if you fuck up on one or two assignments your average would be higher than if you got a zero. The problem is youths are given way too many chances these days to slide by on the good graces of teachers who hate to feel all their hard work is for naught. What it is really doing is setting kids up for failure thinking that they can half ass their way through life and end up with a high paying job.

I see you've met Andy, Sandorski, and Mr. Canada.