More and more is being asked of teachers while many think that teachers are doing less. Test scores and report cards do not show what really is being accomplished by the schools. Recent Federal and State Legislation has helped many schools take a look at what they need to do to improve. This is helpful.

Yet, results are not defined so that the public really understands what is occurring in schools today. Many schools meet 95% of the criteria. Yet, if one area is not met, the school does not make Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) and this impacts funding, especially on poorer schools. It's a process that cries out for explanation.

Many children are learning more, teachers are being asked to do more, but few step up to the plate to help - only to blame. Of course there are teachers who can do a better job. More respect, higher pay and even thanks will help attract and keep those who want to teach. Yet, we can't keep getting dumped on and still feel good about what we do. It's time to reveal the strengths and the limits of what can be expected of good teachers and good schools.

How easy it would be if all it took was more money to enable all of our children succeed in school. We all wish that it were that simple.

Of course, money helps. But it is not the be all and end all determiner in education. Education is more complex than that. This is what often eludes the understanding of some school reformers and many politicians who over depend on money alone to do the job.

Getting money for education is a big challenge. Using it well can be also hard to manage. For openers, if I could trade a roomful of computers for even a few trained teachers, I would do it in an instant. If I could trade a truckload of tests (tests and their grading are very expensive budget items) for trained educators whose job it is to link schools and families, I would do it in a second.

For someone who has championed parent involvement in education, it's hard to say this: but the truth is - - yes, there can be too much parent involvement. When parents become so wound up and wrought up about their child's admission to college that they write and then type their children's essays for college, that is too much. When parents stay up all night completing science fair projects (while children sleep), that is too much.

When parents become so protective of children that any rejection they suffer (including a low grade) feels like a personal rejection, that is too much.

How can we keep a sense of balance about the line between too little involvement and too much? How do we know what is just right? It's not easy.

Teaching is an extraordinary job. In an ideal world, it would be done only by extraordinary people. Yet, even to teach in an ordinary way takes a lot more than what most people have to give on most jobs.

Think of the daily multi-tasking for classroom teachers: do the paperwork, actually teach subjects, keep the entire class engaged for entire class periods, manage discipline, mediate disputes, counsel troubled children, nurse the sick, contact parents - and all before lunch.

Since I was a little girl (a long time ago), I kept hearing this message, often delivered with a smirk: "Those who can, do. Those who can't teach." I went into teaching  anyway.

My father said that teaching was money in the bank, not much, but you can count on it.

After all this time, I am still teaching and I am not sorry. Teaching is more than a noble profession. Teachers, with parents, help create the future. Even when it is hard, teaching makes me feel that I have made a difference.

Of course, we expect too much. These days especially we want teachers to be able to do everything, and when they can't or when they don't, we are disappointed and angry. I don't excuse teachers who ought to be more competent or excuse incompetence in doctors and other professionals. Teachers are like everybody else, but we want them and actually need them to be better. That's part of what is so troubling.

The work of teaching and learning is more complex than we know. There is increasing discussion these days about "highly qualified teachers" as if that alone was going to solve all educational problems. Evaluation and testing, much emphasized today, do not turn poor students into good ones. They are not teaching tools. At best, they check in on what is test-able, not necessarily on what's been learned. While good tests serve diagnostic functions, just as X-rays and MRI's at the doctor's, most testing in school is still used for grading and sorting purposes. Many test results don't even come back until the end of the school year...too late to do any good.

Education is about the transfer of knowledge and "lighting the fire." This occurs in an environment that supports it. One of the biggest lessons I have learned as a teacher is about the extraordinary value of encouragement. This is often seen by "macho" politicians and educators as a soft and weak concept. Quite the opposite, encouragement is a key to educational improvement for teachers as well as students. And it is vastly underused.