x=3.5

Sonny, shouldn’t your sample equations that have integers as their solutions?

Anyhow, on the subject of teacher accountability, let me throw two links your way.  First, there’s an article in this week’s TNR which explains why New York City is paying 1400 teachers to not work.  Why would the city spend $75 million this year on the salaries of non-workers, when the schools have so many other pressing needs.  Well, it’s a complicated answer and it involves the teachers’ union, so go read the article. 

Second, a friend of mine wrote a book called The Emergency Teacher about the year she spent teaching in an inner city high school in Philadelphia.  There are plenty of reasons for the crisis in the Philly schools, but a very important one is the lack of accountability for teachers.  Naturally, the idea of enforced accountability is anathema to the teachers in the City of Brotherly Love.  After all, who really wants to be accountable when it means your job and your salary may be on the line?