Portsmouth, MAINE

Lowering standards in teaching have convinced even the least-qualified to think that they can be teachers. And they are encouraged by a media with even lower standards to think so.

COMING TO A CLASSROOM NEAR YOU SOON -

May 6, 2008 - A 335-pound lineman at the University of Maine was in court to answer to carjacking charges. Bryan Grier, 23, waived his right to a probable cause hearing and outlined his mental health treatment and career plans.

He is charged with felony theft and misdemeanor counts of reckless conduct and robbery. He's receiving mental health treatment since his arrest for carjacking a jeep from a woman. He also forced another car to stop and demanded the male driver hand over his cell phone so he could call his girlfriend.

His lawyer says that Grier has since returned to the university, where he is finishing his senior year, and is expected to graduate with a degree in child development. He wants to be a teacher.

Every newspaper article, including the sympathetic report of his arrest and another article on his entering a mental health facility to address "what may be the underlying cause of his alleged criminal behavior," end with his good grades and his being recognized for breaking the school record in the squat.
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TT - It takes a mental defect to think that anyone with such a history should ever be in a classroom. But chances are he might because more and more states are waiving prior criminal conduct to accept teachers and their behavior. In Oregon, a Senate Committee on Education approved a bill to allow schools to hire teachers who have been convicted of misdemeanor prostitution in the past.

And it isn't just criminal conduct that is accepted. In Massachusetts, the House passed a bill to allow teachers who have failed competency exams three times to appeal and teach anyway. Indiana Governor Mitch Daniel vetoed a similar bill. The teachers union in Dallas is opposed to closing low-performing schools.

What all that tells you is that children are the very last concern of educrats who lower standards, determine that prior criminal history is not a deterrent to becoming a teacher, decide that alcoholism and drug addiction is a disability and teachers convicted of drunk driving four and even five times should still be in the classroom.

Worse, educrats routinely issue dispensation to the guilty in a grand display of beneficence. Suspension where revocation should be dictated is no more than the secular version of the Catholic Church absolving priests of blame for abusing those under their care.

Mandatory reporting laws in all 50 states require teachers and administrators to notify authorities when they have reason to suspect or know of abuse of a child. Yet few are ever charged with failure to report and when they are charged, it's a misdemeanor and does not affect their licenses.

It's an arrogance of power unchecked by public scrutiny because the media largely ignore the problem and politicians who are elected through the efforts and campaign contributions of unions have no interest or incentive to rock the boat and endanger their own well-being.

A society that accepts known drug dealers and addicts to become rap stars and still allow their children to buy the music, and accepts known drug addicts and worse to become movie and t.v. stars and still watch the programs or go to the movie, have little problem accepting teachers with criminal histories and absolutely no aptitude for teaching to be in a classroom.

It's our job - all of us - to say enough is enough.