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If we are truly serious about getting better teachers there are several things we can do that would have more lasting long-term benefits.

1. Demand higher standards for our kids in school. Too many parents say they want better schools but complain when their child is told they are not doing well or is getting poor grades. It must be the teacher's fault they say! Parents need to start demanding higher standards in the classroom and expecting higher standards at home. This means parents must be willing to turn off the television, get off the computer and interact with their children by reading with them, reading to them, helping them with their homework and becoming an active participant in their child's education.

2. The standards in education schools need to be improved. As of now most academics on college campuses recognize that education schools (as Thomas Sowell and others point out) are the academic slums of most universities. They have lower standards for admission as well as lower standards for graduation thus encouraging lesser achieving students to aspire to teach. They figure, "If I can't do anything else well, at least I can teach."

3. Train teachers by emphasizing their subject material as opposed to methods of teaching. This has been argued very cogently by Jacques Barzun (among other prominent educators). Those who teach math should know a lot about math and love it. Those who teach history should know a lot about history and love it. Teachers should have a passion for their subject and be able to communicate it to their students.

Will paying teachers more encourage these other important things to happen? Not necessarily. As an educator myself, I can say that I would not turn down a pay raise but then again paying me more will not necessarily make me a better teacher. As social scientist Charles Murray pointed out years ago, one of the unintended consequences of raising teacher pay while failing to do the other things I suggested above will simply be to encourage more people into teaching who will be poor teachers.

The truth about education is that teachers cannot do it all and so we cannot solve the problem by only focusing on teachers, or worse, focusing only on what teachers are paid. Why are teachers paid less than professional athletes? One factor is supply and demand. Yes, there are too few Michael Jordans but there is also too great a demand. We say we want better education but where do we spend our

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