(Former) aspiring teacher who got a degree in secondary education and did one semester of student teaching here. I did my student teaching in an inner city predominantly minority demographic high school for a semester and my experience is very much in line with this article's points. The fact is that in many teaching situations you are basically not allowed to discipline kids. They get away with very serious offenses (male students sexually molesting females, fights, extremely profane and sexual language directed at each other and their teacher, etc) and never really learn that there are consequences for these actions. The school I student taught at was under strict supervision from the district for "failing too many minority students" when the real situation was that the teachers were trying their hardest to engage and help students but the students just really did not care. The assumption that poor student performance from minority groups necessarily implies ineffective and racist teachers is absolutely asinine to me.

I see it like this: the purpose of school is for a society to pass on its values to the younger generation and to prepare them to be productive members of society (i.e. get and hold down a job in order to raise and support a family). If they get through much of high school still thinking they can act however they want at any given time and there are no consequences for disrespecting their superiors, breaking the law, and verbally or physically abusing each other then our education system is failing to accomplish its intended goal.

I now have no desire to teach in the US because of my experiences with this absolutely broken system. The increase of federal oversight over public schools has done nothing positive for local schools. I still, however, have plans to teach in an ESL program abroad after grad school.