As a retired principal, it is not "more money." It is to get more "bang for the buck" by greater accountability. One of my biggest headaches was tohave non-performing teachers who I could not really touchbecause they are so "insulated" by politics and the teachers' organizations. We would also get more band for the buck if educators had more control over both curriculum and discipline (yes, I come from the "old days" where many of us learned in part becaquse we were afraid of answering to the "board of education"; now administrators often have almost no discipline alternatives, which ultimately results in lowered learning in the classroom).
Maybe Noriega wants more money for education so people like his wife can get their hands on it (as a recent news release seems to indicate she has done).

I teach 8th grade math in a brand new, beautiful school in a large school district. I love my new classroom, but I become more and more frustrated every day when I look around and see how much money was wasted on some of the technology found in all of the classrooms.

Each classroom has a 42" flat screen television which doubles as a monitor for one of the 4 student classroom computers in the room. Each room is also supplied with a SONY DVD/VCR combo. We just had a meeting yesterday in which we were told that we could not show movies unless they were strictly tied to our curriculum. I agree with this, but since I teach math, I never have movies to show in my room. So, why is there a DVD/VCR combo and a 42" flatscreen TV in every classroom at our school? I was told I could show powerpoints on it. Again, that's not very useful when teaching math. Plus the screen is really too small for a classroom presentation other than showing movies.

I do have a LARGE projection screen that I could use for presentations, but it's not practical for teaching math. I don't know what the plans were for such a HUGE screen, but most teachers only need one about half the size. The fact that we have to use portable projectors makes it hard to project anything as large as the screens we were given. We're not allowed to use extension cords, so we can't get the projectors very far from the screen. Smaller screens have to be cheaper screens!

I know I may sound like I'm complaining about things that I should be grateful for, but I am so upset that my district spent so much money on stuff that most teachers have no use for. We were given document cameras, a very cool little gadget, which have to be hooked up to our projector. If we want to project anything from our computer, the computer must be hooked up the projector as well. I have cords running from the projector, the document camera, and my personal laptop (since the cords don't reach the computers in my room) to some plugs at the front of my room. I project things onto my dry-erase board so that my students and I can work problems. I have tripped over these cords several times, as well as my students. Maybe if one of us gets hurt, they'll mount my projector and run the cords through the ceiling to my teacher computer (something I suggested over and over but was told it would cost too much money because contract electricians would have to be hired and they're worried about who would be responsible for changing the bulbs when they burn out).

All I want and need to have a successful year is a SmartBoard, a mounted projector which connects to a computer, and a class set of graphing calculators. If our projectors were mounted, we wouldn't need the document cameras or the 42" flatscreen TV's. All presentations could be shown with our projectors. Hey, then we may actually get to use more of that GIGANTIC screen if the projectors were mounted. Oh, and it would be nice to have an extra copy machine so that I can get copies made in time for my lessons. We have ONE copy machine for a building with over 1400 students and we have one "copy lady" that has to do all the copies (apparently teachers aren't responsible enough to run their own copies).

You can put all the money you want into a classroom, but if the money is used to buy "pretty toys" instead of "useful" ones no one benefits from it. I don't know who made the decisions when it came to buying technology for our new school, but what a waste! Never once were the teachers asked what we wanted or needed in our room to help our students be successful. We could have saved everyone a lot of money and the money that was spent could have gone to better use.

As far as giving incentives to math and science majors to get them into teaching...teaching is not something you can just wake up and decide to do. Those that teach and do it well are the ones who knew they wanted to teach without having to be talked into it. I'm starting my 15th year as a middle school math teacher in Texas. I knew in the 4th grade that I was going to be a teacher. I can't imagine anything more stressful or more rewarding. I also can't imagine any profession more overlooked or unappreciated.

Instead of spending money to try and entice people to become a math or science teacher, let's spend money on keeping the good ones we have. If teachers are happy, maybe more people who are thinking of being a teacher will be more likely to become one. Let’s stop wasting money in schools and then asking for more. Let's spend money on useful tools that students and teachers can use to be successful. Ask for teacher and student input when making decisions about what teachers and students need. Who would know better?