Lessons for legislators

The highest priority for Idaho's 2014 legislative is the same as it has been since the Great Recession ravaged the Gem State: Jobs.

Priority 1a? Education - the path that leads to jobs.

As we like to say, a good life starts with a good job. No, it isn't the Idaho Legislature's business to create good jobs, but it is very much that body's responsibility to make the state as business-friendly as possible. And on all sorts of levels, that means public education must receive all the support the legislature can muster, and be held fully responsible and accountable for results.

Last summer, The Press published a series of editorials recommending a manageable if ambitious starting point to inject new life into public education and close the performance gap between the U.S. and a growing number of other nations. Our suggestion: Focus on teachers. The New York Times is uttering the same battle cry.

In a Dec. 17 editorial, the Times zeroed in on Finland's teacher training as being among the best in the world, leading to one of the planet's finest education systems. In part, the editorial reads:

But the most important effort has been in the training of teachers, where the country leads most of the world, including the United States, thanks to a national decision made in 1979. The country decided to move preparation out of teachers' colleges and into the universities, where it became more rigorous. By professionalizing the teacher corps and raising its value in society, the Finns have made teaching the country's most popular occupation for the young. These programs recruit from the top quarter of the graduating high school class, demonstrating that such training has a prestige lacking in the United States. In 2010, for example, 6,600 applications competed for 660 available primary school preparation slots in the eight Finnish universities that educate teachers.

The teacher training system in this country is abysmal by comparison. A recent report by the National Council on Teacher Quality called teacher preparation programs "an industry of mediocrity," rating only 10 percent of more than 1,200 of them as high quality. Most have low or no academic standards for entry.

And for those who think young Finns are lured to education by big bucks, think again. Finnish teachers earn only slightly more than the national average salary, the Times editorial notes.

In Idaho, fellow legislators would do well to listen to Sen. John Goedde of Coeur d'Alene. Goedde, chairman of the Senate Education Committee, has in recent years said more focus needs to be placed on the quality of teacher education being dispensed at our colleges and universities. Goedde understands that for good jobs we need well-educated workers, and for that we need good teachers, and to develop good teachers we need strong teacher-education programs. Let's see if some worthwhile legislation can help make that happen.