MARYLAND's imminent -- and severe -- teacher shortage is being blamed by some public officials on a lack of money. So they reason they'll fill the void by offering higher salaries and other perks to attract and retain teachers.

Not so fast. There's something else that's causing many experienced teachers to throw in the towel: so-called school improvement. That's what made me retire prematurely after 30 years in Baltimore County classrooms.

Over the past few years, I watched helplessly as most of my autonomy as a teacher was gradually eroded under the guise of school reform. I was told what to teach, when to teach it and precisely how to teach it. Any deviation from the new norms was unacceptable and would result in a lowering of my rating to a "needs improvement" or, worst, "unsatisfactory."

If such ratings continued over three years, the offending teacher would be fired.

I particularly object to the one-size-fits-all formula for conducting a class. For example, in my former school, teachers are directed to write their learning objectives for students on the blackboard every day. Each class is to begin with a student reading the objective from the board.

At the end of the period, the teacher is to review the objective and try to determine if students learned it.

When administrators observe teachers in the classroom, teachers are graded based on whether it's believed that students have learned that particular day's objective. A string of low ratings will lead to a teacher's dismissal.

In discussion with two administrators at my former school, I was critical of the mandate to put the learning objective on the board and have students simply parrot it back. My contention was that it makes far more sense to hide the objective under a screen, teach the lesson and then ask the students what the purpose of the lesson had been.

If they come remotely close to matching what I had put under the screen, they truly learned the new material and could express that knowledge in their own words.

Both administrators looked at me with blank expressions, though they clearly could find nothing wrong with my logic. However, neither administrator endorsed my method -- that would have undermined the system's efforts.

Though I believe my method was better, I told them I would play by their rules when I was being formally observed. That satisfied them but made me deeply ashamed of myself for sacrificing my own principles. Shortly after that conversation I decided to retire.

A second major reason for teachers leaving the classroom is the growing burden of state testing requirements. Instead of teaching dynamic American history lessons, I found myself increasingly burdened with mandatory drills in preparation for some mandated test.

Every week I was saddled with pre-writing activities, pre-reading activities, Maryland School Performance Assessment Program prototypes or counting up minutes of reading time from student logs to see who had enough points to attend a "reward for reading" assembly.

The teacher shortage in Maryland can be solved without one penny of additional money being spent. The answer: Untie the hands of our teachers and let them again become masters of their classrooms and imparters of knowledge. I'll bet that many teachers who had planned to retire or leave the profession would stay.

Most teachers do not enter the profession for the money, nor do they sign on to be robotic puppets for someone else's teaching methods or to administer someone else's tests.

If the lawmakers in Annapolis and the educational bureaucrats in their ivory towers don't admit some of the real reasons behind the current crisis in education, they will be faced with a much greater problem than the 11,000 vacant teaching positions expected by September 2001. They can expect that number to be even greater.

Dorothy W. Dowling, a middle school teacher, recently retired after 30 years of teaching in Baltimore County public schools.

Pub Date: 3/30/99