How bad is Teach for America and why does Vitti want to spend 600 thousands dollars to bring more to town?

From WJXT News: Duval County Public Schools has been recruiting teachers from TFA yearly since 2008. It currently employs just over 200 TFA members.

http://news.wjct.org/post/new-teach-america-contract-not-easy-sell

Just over 200! Friends the district has been bringing in TFA since 2008, first fifty a year but that number ballooned to a hundred a year over the last few years. That means if every teacher from last year and this year is still serving their two-year commitment then just a handful from the first 200 remain.

We need to be putting professional educators and people that might develop into life long teachers into our classrooms not these hobbyists and any justification that we could do it because it was free before has come to an end as the district will be on the hook for at least 600 thousand dollars (not counting professional development) a year if we keep bringing them in.  

This is a vanity play by Gary Chartrand, Vitti’s svengali who initially bought them to town because he has an irrational hatred of teacher unions, Jon Peyton’s paraphrased words, and has nothing to do with what’s best for our kids.

It’s time we followed the lead of Pittsburgh, Tampa and Minnesota and said no to Teach for America.