Waiting... and waiting... and waiting for Superman

On Tuesday, that was the title of the most viewed article on The New York Times website. I stared at my computer screen, baffled by the verb choice.

Stunned? Really?

We have been talking about falling behind China since the 1980s. Thomas Friedman said it in his book “The World is Flat,” President George W. Bush said it when promoting No Child Left Behind, and, most recently, director David Guggenheim said it in his newest documentary, “Waiting for Superman.”

Here are the “stunning” statistics: Out of the 34 countries in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, the United States now ranks 25th in math, 17th in science and 14th in reading on the Program for International Student Assessment. Shanghai, however, ranks first across the board.

Big shocker.

So if it’s safe to say that these numbers are nothing new, then why is the education situation still the same in America? The answer is simple: tenure and teachers’ unions. This is where my allegiance with the Democratic Party hits shaky ground. In the last 30 years, the teachers’ unions have contributed 30 percent more money to the Democratic Party than any other corporation or union has, leaving the party thoroughly intertwined with the unions. Maybe this is why we pretend to be shocked when test scores of eighth graders in Shanghai trounce those of 15-year-olds in America.

Whatever the reason, the education problem can be solved not by simply throwing more money at the issue, but only by politicians brave enough to face the unions head on.

The basic gist of the issue is that most teachers in the public school system get tenure after two or three years of doing adequate work. But once they get that tenure, it becomes nearly impossible to get rid of them. Take this frightening statistic from “Waiting for Superman”: One in 57 doctors will lose their medical license over the course of their lifetimes, one in 97 lawyers will lose their law license, but only one in 2,500 teachers will lose their teaching credentials. Teaching has become a right, not a privilege.

At the 2008 convention for the American Federation of Teachers, the second-largest teachers’ union in the country, AFT President Randi Weingarten said: “Teachers are worth fighting for with every weapon in our arsenal.”

But what about fighting for the kids? Doesn’t this debate, in the end, come down to what is best for them?

Because of the pervasive stereotype that teachers are undervalued and underpaid, this is a problem that we don’t expect. On the surface, teachers’ unions seem great. Who doesn’t want to give teachers a break for the work that they do? Even President John F. Kennedy said, “Modern cynics see no harm in paying those to whom they entrust the minds of their children a smaller wage than is paid to those to whom they entrust the care of their plumbing.”

But this statement needs qualification. Yes, teachers should be appreciated, but like any other profession, they should be appreciated based on the job that they do, not based on a job that they don’t do.

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Until just this month in New York City, the rung of the lowest-performing teachers were sent to a holding station nicknamed the “rubber room.” Unable to go back into the classroom but protected by the laws of tenure, these teachers sat around reading or playing cards to pass the time, all the while being paid their full salary. Pressured by the light shined on these rooms, Mayor Michael Bloomberg formally disbanded them this year. But an article in The New York Times on Tuesday declared that these New York teachers “are still in idle limbo,” doing menial tasks like light filing and paper-clipping.

We are “appreciating” these teachers — and many others who stay in American classrooms — for jobs that they just aren’t doing, wasting massive amounts of taxpayer dollars in the process. Because of the teachers’ unions, teachers are hard to fire and, as a result of tenure’s cozy cushion, teachers who lack true passion for their profession often become ineffective in the classroom.

The way to solve our education crisis in America is easily explained: Give teachers what they deserve. No effective business can be run without reward or punishment for good work or bad work, so why should our education system be any different? The best teachers should be rewarded for superior work, but with today’s tenure laws, all teachers must be paid the same, regardless of their classroom results.

But the situation is not as bleak as it seems. New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie recently spearheaded a committee devoted to creating better teacher evaluations, a controversial move because he excluded the New Jersey Education Association — the primary teachers’ union in the state. The unions and Christie are currently going head to head and we, as Princeton students, can support our governor in these efforts.

The Obama administration is calling the PISA results “the next Sputnik” — the triggering impulse for us to reform our education system. But that landmark transformation will not come with a solely financial offering. We need to stop being stunned and start facing the facts: If we don’t crack down on the unions, kids will have to keep on waiting, and waiting and waiting for a Superman that may never come.

Caroline Kitchener is a freshman from New Canaan, Conn. She can be reached at cakitche@princeton.edu.