Washington
INSIGHTS FROM BILL GATES ON EDUCATION
Fareed Zakaria: If you were the secretary of education, well, let’s say you have - even more powerful than the secretary of education. So suppose you could change something about the structure of American education, the, you know, the system, what would it be?
Bill Gates: If I was in charge of a school district, it would be about hiring the best teachers. And how do you get them to learn from each other and how do you make sure you’re bringing the really good ones in. So the basic research about great teaching, that’s now become our biggest investment.
It could be a very smart investment. One study says that if students had a top teacher for four years straight, the achievement gap between blacks and whites would disappear.
The Gates foundation has launched a massive effort to figure out how America can foster great teaching – collecting data from thousands of educators and even videotaping their lessons.
Fareed Zakaria: What do you think makes a good teacher?
Bill Gates: Clearly, there's something about engaging the student. As I've watched the videos of great teachers, they are constantly looking out and seeing that the kids are starting to fidget. They're bringing up the energy level. They're calling on this kid. They're using examples.
Fareed Zakaria: But Gates’ research is not only about identifying great teachers.
His team is also figuring out how to grade the teachers – just like they grade their students.
They’re looking at different ways to reward and motivate good teachers – like adding to their paychecks based on a principal’s evaluation or their students’ performance.
Bill Gates: Why is teaching going to be better 10 years from now, 20 years from now, than it is today? Well, partly because we’re going to have these feedback mechanisms. Now the way you weigh the different elements, how much tests weigh into that, how strong the other elements are, that’s what we’re investing in.
And that’s where things can get controversial – because when it comes to education policy, the politics are nasty.
Read more: http://goo.gl/D1lbl
Fareed Zakaria: If you were the secretary of education, well, let’s say you have - even more powerful than the secretary of education. So suppose you could change something about the structure of American education, the, you know, the system, what would it be?
Bill Gates: If I was in charge of a school district, it would be about hiring the best teachers. And how do you get them to learn from each other and how do you make sure you’re bringing the really good ones in. So the basic research about great teaching, that’s now become our biggest investment.
It could be a very smart investment. One study says that if students had a top teacher for four years straight, the achievement gap between blacks and whites would disappear.
The Gates foundation has launched a massive effort to figure out how America can foster great teaching – collecting data from thousands of educators and even videotaping their lessons.
Fareed Zakaria: What do you think makes a good teacher?
Bill Gates: Clearly, there's something about engaging the student. As I've watched the videos of great teachers, they are constantly looking out and seeing that the kids are starting to fidget. They're bringing up the energy level. They're calling on this kid. They're using examples.
Fareed Zakaria: But Gates’ research is not only about identifying great teachers.
His team is also figuring out how to grade the teachers – just like they grade their students.
They’re looking at different ways to reward and motivate good teachers – like adding to their paychecks based on a principal’s evaluation or their students’ performance.
Bill Gates: Why is teaching going to be better 10 years from now, 20 years from now, than it is today? Well, partly because we’re going to have these feedback mechanisms. Now the way you weigh the different elements, how much tests weigh into that, how strong the other elements are, that’s what we’re investing in.
And that’s where things can get controversial – because when it comes to education policy, the politics are nasty.
Read more: http://goo.gl/D1lbl
Global Source and/or and/or more resources and/or read more: http://goo.gl/zvSV7 ─ Publisher and/or Author and/or Managing Editor:__Andres Agostini ─ @Futuretronium at Twitter! Futuretronium Book at http://goo.gl/JujXk
