I’m all for creating a new salary band for teachers with 1300+ SAT scores and STEM degrees. I’ll pay whatever taxes you want for that.

Is there any evidence to show that these people make good teachers?

You don't need to be a genious to teach. You need to have good social skills with kids, care about doing a good job, and a mastery of the subject matter (which not very demanding for even average-intelligence adults, at least until the latter part of high school).

Yes to all of those: necessary but not sufficient.

You left out "willing to do whatever it takes for THAT kid, regardless of what the textbooks or principal or union says."

So instead of putting in the work and weighing out the different qualities of an effective educator, you pick out the most arbitrary of criteria out there and want to make that the gold standard for evaluating teachers.

I'm not a betting man, but I'd feel comfortable wagering that you are a STEM grad with solid SAT scores.

I am, and I'd make an awful teacher. Engineers are generally horrible teachers, I think because they've become so immersed in their subject that everything that is entirely alien to the learner seems obvious to them. I'm so impatient. I just want people to repeat after me, do the thing exactly like I said, and to show no initiative.

Teacher unions don't want higher standards.

They don’t want higher standards that are essentially arbitrary and capricious and imposed by boards, committees and other groups composed of individuals who have little or no expertise in teaching.

That’s a bit more accurate than your comment.