Wampum

I agree that these people should be fired for their fraud.

But I would also like to point out that the system provides very perverse incentives to teachers.

Advanced degrees, particularly PhDs, contribute virtually nothing to a teacher's value when they aren't teaching above a high school level, and yet, they dominate the determination of pay.

This provides teachers with an incentive to neglect their teaching and instead devote their time and energy into getting graduate degrees.

In effect, we pay the teachers who spend their time studying more than those who devote all of their time to teaching.

Fix the incentives, and this will stop happening.

No, I disagree.

Look at the figures: 36K? For one of "the most respected professions in our land"? 42K with one degree, 51K with another? THAT'S IT?

I have NO degree and almost make what a PHD in education makes as a teacher.

Yet we should fire them?

They were trying to survive.

We live in an upside down world...

How about this: Raise the salary for every teacher in the land by $10,000, get rid of the degree incentive, and reward seniority and experience over mere paperwork for starters.

Address the problem, not the symptoms.

Advance degrees contribute invaluably to a high school teacher's ability to make the material that s/he is teaching come alive to high school students. The best private schools insist that their teachers have advanced degrees for this very reason.

I don't care what incentives are in place to reward lying, cheating, and stealing. Teaches who set poor examples to their students through fraud, especially academic fraud, must be terminated.

Grimmtooth, Whether or not there is a problem with the pay scale of teachers, are you suggesting that blatant fraud should be overlooked? Also I don't think using seniority as a method to determine the worth of a teacher will fly, good luck getting that idea past the NEA. In fact, I have heard complaints from teachers that are similar to the statements you have made. A common one is that they don't make any money even though they have an advanced degree, yet these same people will complain about needing a degree. That one is frequently expressed by two of my siblings that are high school teachers. The fact is that education has been in the shitter for a while now. If teachers want more money then they should back some reform that many parents/taxpayers want. I meet individual teachers that think reform is needed yet won't go against their union or other teachers. It's not realistic to expect teachers, and administrators for that matter to expect more money, while there have been no substantive improvements in the quality of the general public education system.

A lot of people work hard.

Why is a college degree required to teach 2nd grade math or reading? A masters or Phd to teach gym! Give me a break.

Also teachers only work part-time and have the best retirement benefits on the planet.

A student can be functionally illiterate and still get a HS diploma - and the teaching community is OK with this.

The teachers should be fired for the reasons stated above: they purchased fake degrees which they knew were fakes for the purpose of obtaining a raise. Fraud, and moral turptitude.

The administration and school board should be fired as well. They failed to exercise due diligence by not demanding evidence of the teacher applicants actually having earned the degrees they were claiming and, I suspect, were fully aware that this "St. Regis University" had no standards for granting academic degrees. I doubt they were in the dark about the nature of the diplomas; these are the same people who administer the college placement activities of their high school graduates and they surely knew better. Dereliction.

Dear Sir:
For those of you who so righteously judge the "fake degrees" from a foreign university:
Have you actually looked into this "diploma mill"?
Do you know from first hand experience what the requirements are to get a degree from St. Regis University?
If not why not? Are you comfortable with just accepting third party information to pass judgment?
Non-traditional schools are the envy of many old-fashioned institutions mainly because of the fact that the battle for students is more and more decided by total costs of a degree and by convenience.
If you believe that an on-line education leads to the equivalent of a fake paper then you need to do your homework all over again. Schools such as the University of South Africa and many very highly regarded schools have been active in non-traditional (no classrooms)education with great success.
I have personally spent many months checking out St. Regis University, what I found was impressive.
Innovation, flexibility with integrity is what you will find if you would undertake the effort.
Yes, you can do it the easy way by going to Dr. John Bear, the "expert" on matters of education, traditional and non-traditional. Yet, if you look into the background of this gentleman you will find a lengthy involvement with non-traditional schools, some of which are listed as diploma mills in Oregon, Michigan and internationally.
That's what you get if you trust second hand information.
All my degrees are legitimate and I am on the faculty of St. Regis University.
And, NO, I/we won't sell you ANY kind of a degree. You will have to do the work.

Posted by: Professor Dr. H.H.Nehrlich at April 24, 2004 08:17 PM
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Mark thinks teachers "only work part-time"? Is he for real? Both of my aunts were teachers as is my cousin and his wife and ex-wife. The time spent teaching is not only the time in the classroom, but includes the time preparing for each day of teaching, the time spent grading papers and recording grades, time spent preparing reports for the administration, and time spent attending mandated training courses in order to qualify for merit increases (may vary by state or district). Most of this extra time is taken at home, after the students have gone home and are oustide playing or participating in their extracurriculars. Teaching is FAR MORE than a part-time job - it exceeds a full-time job. In the case of my aunt in Arizona, the mandated training courses almost invariably took place during the school year, rather than the summer. My aunt's primary complaint was that it required the hiring of a substitute who, more often than not, didn't understand the personality of the class and wasn't able to follow the daily plan because of the altered flow of events. Upon her return, she would inevitably have to review what took place in her absence, which obviously placed her further behind in her regular schedule. She loved teaching, but hated the disruption caused by the insistance that she take the required merit courses during the school year - most of which required traveling 4+ hours to attend and, thus, also an overnight stay. Teachers DO deserve more money than they receive as professionals, but they do NOT deserve to keep their jobs (which they went into knowingly) if they commit fraud.