[joshl32532]

> I've heard that public school teachers in the USA generally come from the bottom 20% of their class.

No way this is true. ~57% of teachers have Master's degree or higher. Bottom 20% of their class means they'd barely have enough GPA to graduate, let alone get into a MEd program.

https://nces.ed.gov/surveys/ntps/tables/ntps1718_fltable04_t...

[wrp]

> ~57% of teachers have Master's degree or higher.

This points to an important issue. I think most college-educated people are aware that at a typical university in the USA, the College of Education is separate from the College of Arts & Sciences. What they are probably not aware of without direct experience is the tremendous difference in academic rigor between Education and the Social Sciences. I've been nosing around Education programs for years and a good deal of what goes on in classrooms reminds me of my own experiences in junior high school. We like to joke about classes in Underwater Basket Weaving, but I once actually saw a 10-week, upper-division course in how to make use of a photocopier.

Now to the point. Among the Social Sciences, the field that has developed the most rigor in experimental standards and application of mathematics is probably Psychology. On the other hand, over in the College of Education, there is a field of Educational Psychology, which may be held up as an example of cargo cult science.

Published results on the psychology of learning attract a fair amount of attention on HN, but often the most dramatic reports are coming out of Educational Psychology, not Psychology. Readers need to be aware of the distinction between those fields to better adjust the credence they give to their output.

[jterrys]

Teachers get on special educational programmes that have lighter requirements. For example, they don't get a math degree to teach math. They get a teacher's degree to teach math.

https://www.indeed.com/career-advice/finding-a-job/types-of-...

https://future.utsa.edu/programs/undergraduate/mathematics-f...

[seanmcdirmid]

It isn’t weird that someone teaching K-12 math would learn to teach math to kids rather than focus on advanced math that they would never need or use for their job. Considering that even the most advanced math class in high school usually is a first or second semester class in university.

[jterrys]

Right. But they're not rigorous degrees compared to pure math/science degrees, hence why the bottom 20% observation comes into play.

[seanmcdirmid]

Teaching is a different kind of hard I guess, I wouldn’t say it is easier, especially for those of us who aren’t great at training up soft skills. I’m glad someone can make a good career out of it, I don’t think I could.

[coryrc]

Of people taking the GRE, teachers have the lowest scores.

[coryrc]

Here's the evidence: https://www.umsl.edu/~philo/files/pdfs/ETS%20LINK.pdf

[joshl32532]

Interesting...

[coryrc]

There's some obvious caveats:

1. Not everyone who becomes a teacher is getting a teacher major. English Lit scores well in two areas.

2. Special education is just very expensive babysitting, so they don't actually need to know anything.

3. If you ever wonder why kids aren't learning math well, this should explain it. Every teaching major is in the bottom half of scores. Fucking nurses score better!

[xp84]

Tell me you’ve never been involved with SpEd without telling me.

[thfuran]

But if less than half of adults have any kind of college degree and more than half of teachers have a master's, just saying "the teachers are the bottom 20% of the class" is, at best, extremely misleading—it's not even the same class as the average non-teacher.

[NooneAtAll3]

what's GRE?

[xp84]

Don’t a lot of teachers who have a masters get that degree later on after they’ve been teaching? (If I understand correctly, it’s a direct ticket to a pay raise).

[seanmcdirmid]

It is probably impossible to compare education majors to say computer science majors just on their collegiate GPA, or comparing masters program admissions between those (mostly education graduates will go on to enter a masters in education program). There must be something else they are comparing, or maybe the fact is just made up (likely it is impossible to make this claim).