As an anecdote, I was a math major. I took an elective course on the history of mathematics, which must have been a requirement for math education majors, who were under a separate department and even college (i.e., not the math department or college of the arts and sciences). I was the only math major, and I'm pretty sure the only male in a class of about 20 or so. The professor was one of the easiest and most straightforward professors, basically giving out a study guide of homework problems that directly reflected what was to be on the exams. I am fairly certain I got 100% on all exams.

I have never witnessed more complaining and moaning from students than I did in that class. The education majors (i.e., everyone else) complained about absolutely everything, from the book to the professor to the material itself to "difficulty" of the course. It was unbelievable that these people were supposedly wanting to be math teachers but were complaining endlessly about a history of mathematics course. I experienced basically the same from the education majors in the introduction to proofs class.

My mom was a teacher, but those experiences forever tainted the picture of a modern day teacher. In fact, one of the primary reasons my mom retired early was due to her fellow teachers and requirements from the school. She was mandated to use PowerPoint and share lesson plans. But the lesson plans received from the younger teachers weren't up to her standards, so my mom usually had to redo the others' lesson plans, on top of her assigned lesson plan material. Additionally, the kids with the lowest test scores and behavioral problems were usually transferred to my mom's homeroom class for her to help turnaround, which she usually did. What an absolute nightmare.

The root problem with the US education system is the same thing with the rest of US government programs:

There is no bankruptcy mechanism for government agencies.

Bankruptcy removes poorly run private companies from the marketplace. There is no such mechanism for government agencies... so poorly run agencies remain in place a hundred years after they lost their effectiveness.

Why does a public school classroom still look the same today as it did 150 years ago? Ridiculous. Remove the education government agency and you will see hundreds of better options spring up.

Also - bring back corporal punishment. Sure, it was misused in 1% of cases, but it has led to 1000x the problems from students who have no respect for teachers.

Education programs are the cash cows of universities. They are universally, intentionally subpar compared to the other colleges.

How so? Do schools underfund these programs yet heavily promote them?

They lower their admission and graduation standards. Mark em up, shop em on.

Any articles or posts on this? I'd like to read further.

Google it. It's a racket. Teacher's unions have negotiated automatic pay raises for certain educational attainments. Those attainments are certified by the Ed Schools. It's basically the certification program scam.

Maybe teachers in the minority gender experience less positive interactions with certain colleagues than teachers in the majority gender?

My parents were both teachers.

A significant trunk of my classmates went into teaching after college. We keep in touch.

The above comment is accurate.

Clarifying my ambiguous response: "Above comment" refers to "most teachers are jobsworths that don't care about their students".

Not a nice day to be your parents or friend :D

They agree with me.

Which "above comment"?

"Above" typically means above in thread, i.e. "parent", i.e. the post/comment one replies to.

The previous comments are not logically equivalent, (bitwise AND) have the same truth value.

I agree it is fully ambiguous as to which above refers in this case.

yes.

That the high school teaching experience is vastly different from your wife's experiences teaching primary school children... seems to make sense?