Will Firing 5-10% of Teachers Make Us Finland?

The 5-10% Solution, was written by Matthew di Carlo, and originally published on the Shanker Blog, and then reposted on Valerie Strass' The Answer Sheet.


In the world of education policy, the following assertion has become ubiquitous: If we just fire the bottom 5-10 percent of teachers, our test scores will be at the level of the highest-performing nations, such as Finland. Michelle Rhee likes to make this claim. So does Bill Gates.

The source and sole support for this claim is a calculation by economist Eric Hanushek, which he sketches out roughly in a chapter of the edited volume Creating a New Teaching Profession (published by the Urban Institute). The chapter is called “Teacher Deselection” (“deselection” is a polite way of saying “firing”)

To read the rest, please visit the Shanker Blog or The Answer Sheet.