Teacher

Classroom at a secondary school in Pendembu, Sierra Leone.
Occupation
Names	Teacher, schoolteacher
Activity sectors	Education
Description
Competencies	Teaching abilities, pleasant disposition, patience
Education required	Teaching certification

Jewish children with their teacher in Samarkand, the beginning of the 20th century

A teacher or schoolteacher is a person who provides education for pupils (children) and students (adults). The role of teacher is often formal and ongoing, carried out at a school or other place of formal education. In many countries, a person who wishes to become a teacher must first obtain specified professional qualifications or credentials from a university or college. These professional qualifications may include the study of pedagogy, the science of teaching. Teachers, like other professionals, may have to continue their education after they qualify, a process known as continuing professional development. Teachers may use a lesson plan to facilitate student learning, providing a course of study which is called the curriculum.

A teacher's role may vary among cultures. Teachers may provide instruction in literacy and numeracy, craftsmanship or vocational training, the arts, religion, civics, community roles, or life skills.

A teacher who facilitates education for an individual may also be described as a personal tutor, or, largely historically, a governess.

In some countries, formal education can take place through home schooling. Informal learning may be assisted by a teacher occupying a transient or ongoing role, such as a family member, or by anyone with knowledge or skills in the wider community setting.

Religious and spiritual teachers, such as gurus, mullahs, rabbis, pastors/youth pastors and lamas, may teach religious texts such as the Quran, Torah or Bible.

Professional educators[link]

This section needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (January 2008)

A teacher of a Latin school and two students, 1487

Teaching may be carried out informally, within the family which is called home schooling (see Homeschooling) or the wider community. Formal teaching may be carried out by paid professionals. Such professionals enjoy a status in some societies on a par with physicians, lawyers, engineers, and accountants (Chartered or CPA).

A teacher's professional duties may extend beyond formal teaching. Outside of the classroom teachers may accompany students on field trips, supervise study halls, help with the organization of school functions, and serve as supervisors for extracurricular activities. In some education systems, teachers may have responsibility for student discipline.

Around the world teachers are often required to obtain specialized education, knowledge, codes of ethics and internal monitoring.

There are a variety of bodies designed to instill, preserve and update the knowledge and professional standing of teachers. Around the world many governments operate teacher's colleges, which are generally established to serve and protect the public interest through certifying, governing and enforcing the standards of practice for the teaching profession.

The functions of the teacher's colleges may include setting out clear standards of practice, providing for the ongoing education of teachers, investigating complaints involving members, conducting hearings into allegations of professional misconduct and taking appropriate disciplinary action and accrediting teacher education programs. In many situations teachers in publicly funded schools must be members in good standing with the college, and private schools may also require their teachers to be college peoples. In other areas these roles may belong to the State Board of Education, the Superintendent of Public Instruction, the State Education Agency or other governmental bodies. In still other areas Teaching Unions may be responsible for some or all of these duties.

Pedagogy and teaching[link]

Dutch schoolmaster and children, 1662

A primary school teacher in northern Laos

The teacher-student-monument in Rostock, Germany, honours teachers

In education, teachers facilitate student learning, often in a school or academy or perhaps in another environment such as outdoors. A teacher who teaches on an individual basis may be described as a tutor.

GDR "village teacher", a teacher teaching students of all age groups in one class in 1951

The objective is typically accomplished through either an informal or formal approach to learning, including a course of study and lesson plan that teaches skills, knowledge and/or thinking skills. Different ways to teach are often referred to as pedagogy. When deciding what teaching method to use teachers consider students' background knowledge, environment, and their learning goals as well as standardized curricula as determined by the relevant authority. Many times, teachers assist in learning outside of the classroom by accompanying students on field trips. The increasing use of technology, specifically the rise of the internet over the past decade, has begun to shape the way teachers approach their roles in the classroom.

The objective is typically a course of study, lesson plan, or a practical skill. A teacher may follow standardized curricula as determined by the relevant authority. The teacher may interact with students of different ages, from infants to adults, students with different abilities and students with learning disabilities.

Teaching using pedagogy also involve assessing the educational levels of the students on particular skills. Understanding the pedagogy of the students in a classroom involves using differentiated instruction as well as supervision to meet the needs of all students in the classroom. Pedagogy can be thought of in two manners. First, teaching itself can be taught in many different ways, hence, using a pedagogy of teaching styles. Second, the pedagogy of the learners comes into play when a teacher assesses the pedagogic diversity of his/her students and differentiates for the individual students accordingly.

Perhaps the most significant difference between primary school and secondary school teaching is the relationship between teachers and children. In primary schools each class has a teacher who stays with them for most of the week and will teach them the whole curriculum. In secondary schools they will be taught by different subject specialists each session during the week and may have 10 or more different teachers. The relationship between children and their teachers tends to be closer in the primary school where they act as form tutor, specialist teacher and surrogate parent during the course of the day.

This is true throughout most of the United States as well. However, alternative approaches for primary education do exist. One of these, sometimes referred to as a "platoon" system, involves placing a group of students together in one class that moves from one specialist to another for every subject. The advantage here is that students learn from teachers who specialize in one subject and who tend to be more knowledgeable in that one area than a teacher who teaches many subjects. Students still derive a strong sense of security by staying with the same group of peers for all classes.

Co-teaching has also become a new trend amongst educational institutions. Co-teaching is defined as two or more teachers working harmoniously to fulfill the needs of every student in the classroom. Co-teaching focuses the student on learning by providing a social networking support that allows them to reach their full cognitive potential. Co-teachers work in sync with one another to create a climate of learning.

Rights to enforce school discipline[link]

Throughout the history of education the most common form of school discipline was corporal punishment. While a child was in school, a teacher was expected to act as a substitute parent, with all the normal forms of parental discipline open to them.

Medieval schoolboy birched on the bare buttocks

In past times, corporal punishment (spanking or paddling or caning or strapping or birching the student in order to cause physical pain) was one of the most common forms of school discipline throughout much of the world. Most Western countries, and some others, have now banned it, but it remains lawful in the United States following a US Supreme Court decision in 1977 which held that paddling did not violate the US Constitution.^[1]

30 US states have banned corporal punishment, the others (mostly in the South) have not. It is still used to a significant (though declining) degree in some public schools in Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, Oklahoma, Tennessee and Texas. Private schools in these and most other states may also use it. Corporal punishment in American schools is administered to the seat of the student's trousers or skirt with a specially made wooden paddle. This often used to take place in the classroom or hallway, but nowadays the punishment is usually given privately in the principal's office.

Official corporal punishment, often by caning, remains commonplace in schools in some Asian, African and Caribbean countries. For details of individual countries see School corporal punishment.

Currently detention is one of the most common punishments in schools in the United States, the UK, Ireland, Singapore and other countries. It requires the pupil to remain in school at a given time in the school day (such as lunch, recess or after school); or even to attend school on a non-school day, e.g. "Saturday detention" held at some US schools. During detention, students normally have to sit in a classroom and do work, write lines or a punishment essay, or sit quietly.

A modern example of school discipline in North America and Western Europe relies upon the idea of an assertive teacher who is prepared to impose their will upon a class. Positive reinforcement is balanced with immediate and fair punishment for misbehavior and firm, clear boundaries define what is appropriate and inappropriate behavior. Teachers are expected to respect their students; sarcasm and attempts to humiliate pupils are seen as falling outside of what constitutes reasonable discipline.^{[verification needed]}

Whilst this is the consensus viewpoint amongst the majority of academics, some teachers and parents advocate a more assertive and confrontational style of discipline.^{[citation needed]} Such individuals claim that many problems with modern schooling stem from the weakness in school discipline and if teachers exercised firm control over the classroom they would be able to teach more efficiently. This viewpoint is supported by the educational attainment of countries—in East Asia for instance—that combine strict discipline with high standards of education.^{[citation needed]}

It's not clear, however that this stereotypical view reflects the reality of East Asian classrooms or that the educational goals in these countries are commensurable with those in Western countries. In Japan, for example, although average attainment on standardized tests may exceed those in Western countries, classroom discipline and behavior is highly problematic. Although, officially, schools have extremely rigid codes of behavior, in practice many teachers find the students unmanageable and do not enforce discipline at all.

Where school class sizes are typically 40 to 50 students, maintaining order in the classroom can divert the teacher from instruction, leaving little opportunity for concentration and focus on what is being taught. In response, teachers may concentrate their attention on motivated students, ignoring attention-seeking and disruptive students. The result of this is that motivated students, facing demanding university entrance examinations, receive disproportionate resources. Given the emphasis on attainment of university places, administrators and governors may regard this policy as appropriate.

Obligation to honor students rights[link]

Sudbury model democratic schools claim that popularly based authority can maintain order more effectively than dictatorial authority for governments and schools alike. They also claim that in these schools the preservation of public order is easier and more efficient than anywhere else. Primarily because rules and regulations are made by the community as a whole, thence the school atmosphere is one of persuasion and negotiation, rather than confrontation since there is no one to confront. Sudbury model democratic schools' proponents argue that a school that has good, clear laws, fairly and democratically passed by the entire school community, and a good judicial system for enforcing these laws, is a school in which community discipline prevails, and in which an increasingly sophisticated concept of law and order develops, against other schools today, where rules are arbitrary, authority is absolute, punishment is capricious, and due process of law is unknown.^[2][3]

Teacher enthusiasm[link]

A teacher and young pupils at The British Museum Duveen Gallery

Since teachers can affect how students perceive the course materials, it has been found that teachers who showed enthusiasm towards the course materials and students can affect a positive learning experience towards the course materials. On teacher/course evaluations, it was found that teachers who have a positive disposition towards the course content tend to transfer their passion to receptive students.^[4] These teachers do not teach by rote but attempt to find new invigoration for the course materials on a daily basis.^[5] One of the difficulties in this approach is that teachers may have repeatedly covered a curriculum until they begin to feel bored with the subject which in turn bores the students as well. Students who had enthusiastic teachers tend to rate them higher than teachers who didn’t show much enthusiasm for the course materials.^{[citation needed]}

Teachers that exhibit enthusiasm can lead to students who are more likely to be engaged, interested, energetic, and curious about learning the subject matter. Recent research has found a correlation between teacher enthusiasm and students’ intrinsic motivation to learn and vitality in the classroom.^[6] Controlled, experimental studies exploring intrinsic motivation of college students has shown that nonverbal expressions of enthusiasm, such as demonstrative gesturing, dramatic movements which are varied, and emotional facial expressions, result in college students reporting higher levels of intrinsic motivation to learn.^{[citation needed]} Students who experienced a very enthusiastic teacher were more likely to read lecture material outside of the classroom.

There are various mechanisms by which teacher enthusiasm may facilitate higher levels of intrinsic motivation. Teacher enthusiasm may contribute to a classroom atmosphere full of energy and enthusiasm which feed student interest and excitement in learning the subject matter.^{[citation needed]} Enthusiastic teachers may also lead to students becoming more self-determined in their own learning process. The concept of mere exposure indicates that the teacher’s enthusiasm may contribute to the student’s expectations about intrinsic motivation in the context of learning. Also, enthusiasm may act as a “motivational embellishment”; increasing a student’s interest by the variety, novelty, and surprise of the enthusiastic teacher’s presentation of the material. Finally, the concept of emotional contagion, may also apply. Students may become more intrinsically motivated by catching onto the enthusiasm and energy of the teacher.^{[citation needed]}

Research shows that student motivation and attitudes towards school are closely linked to student-teacher relationships. Enthusiastic teachers are particularly good at creating beneficial relations with their students. Their ability to create effective learning environments that foster student achievement depends on the kind of relationship they build with their students.^{[7][8][9][10]} Useful teacher-to-student interactions are crucial in linking academic success with personal achievement.^[11] Here, personal success is a student's internal goal of improving himself, whereas academic success includes the goals he receives from his superior. A teacher must guide his student in aligning his personal goals with his academic goals. Students who receive this positive influence show stronger self-confidence and greater personal and academic success than those without these teacher interactions.^[10][12][13]

Students are likely to build stronger relations with teachers who are friendly and supportive and will show more interest in courses taught by these teachers.^[11][12] Teachers that spend more time interacting and working directly with students are perceived as supportive and effective teachers. Effective teachers have been shown to invite student participation and decision making, allow humor into their classroom, and demonstrate a willingness to play.^[8]

The way a teacher promotes the course they are teaching, the more the student will get out of the subject matter. The three most important aspects of teacher enthusiasm are enthusiasm about teaching, enthusiasm about the students, and enthusiasm about the subject matter. A teacher must enjoy teaching. If they do not enjoy what they are doing, the students will be able to tell. They also must enjoy being around their students. A teacher who cares for their students is going to help that individual succeed in their life in the future. The teacher also needs to be enthusiastic about the subject matter they are teaching. For example, a teacher talking about chemsitry needs to enjoy the art of chemistry and show that to their students. A spark in the teacher may create a spark of excitement in the student as well. A enthusiastic teacher has the ability to be very influential in the young students life.

Misconduct[link]

Misconduct by teachers, especially sexual misconduct, has been getting increased scrutiny from the media and the courts.^[14] A study by the American Association of University Women reported that 9.6% of students in the United States claim to have received unwanted sexual attention from an adult associated with education; be they a volunteer, bus driver, teacher, administrator or other adult; sometime during their educational career.^[15]

A study in England showed a 0.3% prevalence of sexual abuse by any professional, a group that included priests, religious leaders, and case workers as well as teachers.^[16] It is important to note, however, that the British study referenced above is the only one of its kind and consisted of "a random ... probability sample of 2,869 young people between the ages of 18 and 24 in a computer-assisted study" and that the questions referred to "sexual abuse with a professional," not necessarily a teacher. It is therefore logical to conclude that information on the percentage of abuses by teachers in the United Kingdom is not explicitly available and therefore not necessarily reliable. The AAUW study, however, posed questions about fourteen types of sexual harassment and various degrees of frequency and included only abuses by teachers. "The sample was drawn from a list of 80,000 schools to create a stratified two-stage sample design of 2,065 8th to 11th grade students"Its reliability was gauged at 95% with a 4% margin of error.

In the United States especially, several high-profile cases such as Debra LaFave, Pamela Rogers, and Mary Kay Latourneau have caused increased scrutiny on teacher misconduct.

Chris Keates, the general secretary of National Association of Schoolmasters Union of Women Teachers, said that teachers who have sex with pupils over the age of consent should not be placed on the sex offenders register and that prosecution for statutory rape "is a real anomaly in the law that we are concerned about." This has led to outrage from child protection and parental rights groups.^[17]

Teaching around the world[link]

There are many similarities and differences among teachers around the world. In almost all countries teachers are educated in a university or college. Governments may require certification by a recognized body before they can teach in a school. In many countries, elementary school education certificate is earned after completion of high school. The high school student follows an education specialty track, obtain the prerequisite "student-teaching" time, and receive a special diploma to begin teaching after graduation.

International schools generally follow an English-speaking, Western curriculum and are aimed at expatriate communities.^[18]

Canada[link]

Teaching in Canada requires a post-secondary degree Bachelor's Degree. In most provinces a second Bachelor's Degree such as a Bachelor of Education is required to become a qualified teacher. Salary ranges from $40,000/year to $90,000/yr. Teachers have the option to teach for a public school which is funded by the provincial government or teaching in a private school which is funded by the private sector, businesses and sponsors.

England[link]

Salaries for Nursery, Primary and Secondary School teachers ranged from £20,133 to £41,004 in September 2007, although some salaries can go much higher depending on experience and extra responsibilities.^[19] Preschool teachers may earn £20,980 annually.^{[citation needed]} Teachers in state schools must have at least a bachelor's degree, complete an approved teacher education program, and be licensed.

Many counties offer alternative licensing programs to attract people into teaching, especially for hard-to-fill positions. Excellent job opportunities are expected as retirements, especially among secondary school teachers, outweigh slowing enrollment growth; opportunities will vary by geographic area and subject taught.^{[citation needed]}

France[link]

In France, teachers, or professors, are mainly civil servants, recruited by competitive examination.

Republic of Ireland[link]

Salaries for primary teachers in the Republic of Ireland depend mainly on seniority (i.e. holding the position of principal, deputy principal or assistant principal), experience and qualifications. Extra pay is also given for teaching through the Irish language, in a Gaeltacht area or on an island. The basic pay for a starting teacher is €30,904 p.a., rising incrementally to €59,359 for a teacher with 25 years' service. A principal of a large school with many years' experience and several qualifications (M.A., H.Dip., etc.) could earn over €90,000.^[20]

Scotland[link]

In Scotland, anyone wishing to teach must be registered with the General Teaching Council for Scotland (GTCS). Teaching in Scotland is an all graduate profession and the normal route for graduates wishing to teach is to complete a programme of Initial Teacher Education (ITE) at one of the seven Scottish Universities who offer these courses. Once successfully completed, "Provisional Registration" is given by the GTCS which is raised to "Full Registration" status after a year if there is sufficient evidence to show that the "Standard for Full Registration" has been met.^[21]

For the salary year beginning April 2008, unpromoted teachers in Scotland earned from £20,427 for a Probationer, up to £32,583 after 6 years teaching, but could then go on to earn up to £39,942 as they complete the modules to earn Chartered Teacher Status (requiring at least 6 years at up to two modules per year.) Promotion to Principal Teacher positions attracts a salary of between £34,566 and £44,616; Deputy Head, and Head teachers earn from £40,290 to £78,642.^[22] Teachers in Scotland can be registered members of trade unions such as ATL.

United States[link]

In the United States, each state determines the requirements for getting a license to teach in public schools. Teaching certification generally lasts three years, but teachers can receive certificates that last as long as ten years.^[23] Public school teachers are required to have a bachelor's degree and the majority must be certified by the state in which they teach. Many charter schools do not require that their teachers be certified, provided they meet the standards to be highly qualified as set by No Child Left Behind. Additionally, the requirements for substitute/temporary teachers are generally not as rigorous as those for full-time professionals. The Bureau of Labor Statistics estimates that there are 1.4 million elementary school teachers,^[24] 674,000 middle school teachers,^[25] and 1 million secondary school teachers employed in the U.S.^[26]

In the past, teachers have been paid relatively low salaries. However, average teacher salaries have improved rapidly in recent years. US teachers are generally paid on graduated scales, with income depending on experience. Teachers with more experience and higher education earn more than those with a standard bachelor’s degree and certificate. Salaries vary greatly depending on state, relative cost of living, and grade taught. Salaries also vary within states where wealthy suburban school districts generally have higher salary schedules than other districts. The median salary for all primary and secondary teachers was $46,000 in 2004, with the average entry salary for a teacher with a bachelor's degree being an estimated $32,000. Median salaries for preschool teachers, however, were less than half the national median for secondary teachers, clock in at an estimated $21,000 in 2004.^[27] For high school teachers, median salaries in 2007 ranged from $35,000 in South Dakota to $71,000 in New York, with a national median of $52,000.^[28] Some contracts may include long-term disability insurance, life insurance, emergency/personal leave and investment options.^[29] The American Federation of Teachers' teacher salary survey for the 2006-07 school year found that the average teacher salary was $51,009.^[30] In a salary survey report for K-12 teachers, elementary school teachers had the lowest median salary earning $39,259. High school teachers had the highest median salary earning $41,855.^[31] Many teachers take advantage of the opportunity to increase their income by supervising after-school programs and other extracurricular activities. In addition to monetary compensation, public school teachers may also enjoy greater benefits (like health insurance) compared to other occupations. Merit pay systems are on the rise for teachers, paying teachers extra money based on excellent classroom evaluations, high test scores and for high success at their overall school. Also, with the advent of the internet, many teachers are now selling their lesson plans to other teachers through the web in order to earn supplemental income, most notably on TeachersPayTeachers.com.^[32]

Wales[link]

Education in Wales differs in certain respects from education elsewhere in the United Kingdom. For example, a significant number of students all over Wales are educated either wholly or largely through the medium of Welsh: in 2008/09, 22 per cent of classes in maintained primary schools used Welsh as the sole or main medium of instruction. Welsh medium education is available to all age groups through nurseries, schools, colleges and universities and in adult education; lessons in the language itself are compulsory for all pupils until the age of 16.

Teachers in Wales can be registered members of trade unions such as ATL, NUT or NASUWT and reports in recent years suggest that the average age of teachers in Wales is falling with teachers being younger than in previous years.^[33] A growing cause of concern are that attacks on teachers in Welsh schools which reached an all-time high between 2005 and 2010.^[34]

Spiritual teacher[link]

In Hinduism the spiritual teacher is known as a guru. In the Latter Day Saint movement the teacher is an office in the Aaronic priesthood, while in Tibetan Buddhism the teachers of Dharma in Tibet are most commonly called a Lama. A Lama who has through phowa and siddhi consciously determined to be reborn, often many times, in order to continue their Bodhisattva vow is called a Tulku.

There are many concepts of teachers in Islam, ranging from mullahs (the teachers at madrassas) to ulemas.

A Rabbi is generally regarded as the Jewish spiritual teacher.^{[citation needed]}

Popular educators[link]

See also[link]

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Teachers

Look up teacher in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

Media related to Teaching at Wikimedia Commons

Paula Fox (born April 22, 1923) is an American author of novels for adults and children and two memoirs. She won multiple awards for her children's books: the 1974 Newbery Medal for her novel The Slave Dancer; a 1983 National Book Award in category Children's Fiction (paperback) for A Place Apart;^[1] the 2008 Deutscher Jugendliteraturpreis for A Portrait of Ivan (1969); and the biennial Hans Christian Andersen Medal for "lasting contribution" in 1978.

Her adult novels went out of print in 1992. In the mid nineties she enjoyed a revival as her adult fiction was championed by a new generation of American writers.^[2]

Life[link]

Paula Fox was born in New York, New York on April 22, 1923. Her father, Paul Hervey Fox, wrote screenplays and was often drunk. Her Cuban-born mother, Elsie De Sola Fox, rejected her at birth and left her in a foundling home. Her maternal grandmother, temporarily visiting New York City, rescued her. Unable at the time to provide a home herself, the Cuban grandmother gave the infant to Reverend Elwood Corning (fondly called Uncle Elwood) and his bedridden mother in Balmville, New York.^[3] The Reverend treated Paula kindly, teaching her important things along the way. Fox first visited her parents at the age of five, when her mother treated her like a prisoner in war. The reunion was so traumatic, she wrote in her memoir Borrowed Finery, "I sensed that if she could have hidden the act she would have killed me."^[4]

A teenage marriage to Howard Bird produced a daughter, Linda, in 1944.^[a] However, given the tumultuous relationship with her own biological parents, she gave the child up for adoption. Fox later attended Columbia University, married the literary critic and translator Martin Greenberg, had two sons, and worked for years as a teacher and as a tutor for troubled children. Only in her 40s did she begin her first novel, Poor George, about a cynical school teacher who finds purpose—and ruin—in mentoring a vagrant teenager.^[5] The novel was received well (Bernard Bergonzi in the New York Review of Books calling it "the best novel I've read in a long time") but sold poorly, a pattern that all her adult novels would follow. Desperate Characters, an acknowledged masterpiece, came next with Alfred Kazin calling it a "brilliant performance" and "quite devastating" while Lionel Trilling described it as "a reserved and beautifully realized novel". By 1992 all six of her novels were out of print.^[4]

Works[link]

Adult Fiction[link]

• 1967 Poor George
• 1970 Desperate Characters
• 1972 The Western Coast
• 1976 The Widow’s Children
• 1984 A Servant’s Tale
• 1990 The God of Nightmares
• 2011 News from the World: Stories and Essays

Children's Fiction[link]

• 1966 Maurice's Room (pictures by Ingrid Fetz)
• 1967 How Many Miles to Babylon? (illustrated by Paul Giovanopoulos)
• 1967 A Likely Place (illustrated by Edward Ardizzone)
• 1968 Dear Prosper (illustrated by Steve McLachlin)
• 1968 The Stone-Faced Boy (illustrated by Donald A. Mackay)
• 1969 Hungry Fred (illustrated by Rosemary Wells)
• 1969 The King's Falcon (illustrated by Eros Keith)
• 1969 Portrait of Ivan (illustrated by Saul Lambert)
• 1970 Blowfish Live in the Sea — NBA finalist^[b]
• 1973 Good Ethan (illustrated by Arnold Lobel)
• 1974 The Slave Dancer (illustrated by Eros Keith)
• 1978 The Little Swineherd and Other Tales (1996 edition illustrated by Robert Byrd) — NBA finalist^[b]
• 1980 A Place Apart
• 1984 One-Eyed Cat
• 1986 The Moonlight Man ISBN 0-02-735480-6
• 1987 Lily and the Lost Boy (also published as The Lost Boy) ISBN 0-531-08320-9
• 1988 The Village by the Sea (also published as In a Place of Darkness)
• 1991 Monkey Island
• 1993 Western Wind
• 1995 The Eagle Kite (also published as The Gathering Darkness)
• 1997 Radiance Descending
• 1999 Amzat and His Brothers: Three Italian Tales

Memoirs[link]

• 2001 Borrowed Finery
• 2005 The Coldest Winter: A Stringer in Liberated Europe

See also[link]

Literature portal

• List of Cuban American writers
• List of Famous Cuban-Americans

Notes[link]

References[link]

External links[link]

• Oliver Broudy (Summer 2004). "Paula Fox, The Art of Fiction No. 181". Paris Review. http://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/1/the-art-of-fiction-no-181-paula-fox. 
• Interview with Ramona Koval, for The Book Show on ABC Radio National July, 2004^{[dead link]}
• Paula Fox bio on frontstreetbooks.com
• Jesse Lichtenstein interviews Paula Fox for Loggernaut.
• Interview with Paula Fox at the Rumpus

Bill Gates
Gates at the World Economic Forum in 2007
Born	William Henry Gates III (1955-10-28) October 28, 1955 (age 56) Seattle, Washington, United States
Residence	Medina, Washington, United States
Nationality	American
Alma mater	Harvard University (dropped out)
Occupation	Chairman of Microsoft Co-Chair of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation CEO of Cascade Investment Chairman of Corbis
Years active	1975–present
Net worth	US$ 61 billion (2012)[1]
Board member of	Berkshire Hathaway
Religion	None (Agnostic[2][3])
Spouse	Melinda Gates (m. 1994) «start: (1994)»"Marriage: Melinda Gates to Bill Gates" Location: (linkback:http://en-wiki.pop.wn.com/index.php/Bill_Gates)
Children	3
Parents	William H. Gates, Sr. Mary Maxwell Gates
Signature
Website
Bill Gates

William Henry "Bill" Gates III (born October 28, 1955 in Seattle, Washington)^[4] is an American business magnate, computer programmer and philanthropist. Gates is the former chief executive officer (CEO) and current chairman of Microsoft, the world’s largest personal-computer software company he co-founded with Paul Allen. He is consistently ranked among the world's wealthiest people^[5] and was the wealthiest overall from 1995 to 2009, excluding 2008, when he was ranked third;^[6] in 2011 he was the wealthiest American and the second wealthiest person.^[7][8] During his career at Microsoft, Gates held the positions of CEO and chief software architect, and remains the largest individual shareholder, with 6.4 percent of the common stock.^[9] He has also authored or co-authored several books.

Gates is one of the best-known entrepreneurs of the personal computer revolution. Gates has been criticized for his business tactics, which have been considered anti-competitive, an opinion which has in some cases been upheld by the courts.^[10][11] In the later stages of his career, Gates has pursued a number of philanthropic endeavors, donating large amounts of money to various charitable organizations and scientific research programs through the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, established in 2000.^[12]

Gates stepped down as chief executive officer of Microsoft in January 2000. He remained as chairman and created the position of chief software architect. In June 2006, Gates announced that he would be transitioning from full-time work at Microsoft to part-time work, and full-time work at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. He gradually transferred his duties to Ray Ozzie, chief software architect, and Craig Mundie, chief research and strategy officer. Gates's last full-time day at Microsoft was June 27, 2008. He remains at Microsoft as non-executive chairman.

Early life[link]

Bill Gates was photographed by the Albuquerque, New Mexico police in 1977 after a traffic violation (details of which have been lost over time).

Gates was born in Seattle, Washington, to William H. Gates, Sr. and Mary Maxwell Gates. His parents are of English, German, and Scots-Irish descent.^[13][14] His father was a prominent lawyer, and his mother served on the board of directors for First Interstate BancSystem and the United Way. Gates's maternal grandfather was J. W. Maxwell, a national bank president. Gates has one elder sister, Kristi (Kristianne), and one younger sister, Libby. He was the fourth of his name in his family, but was known as William Gates III or "Trey" because his father had the "II" suffix.^[15] Early on in his life, Gates's parents had a law career in mind for him.^[16] When Gates was young, his family regularly attended a Congregational church.^[17][18][19]

At 13 he enrolled in the Lakeside School, an exclusive preparatory school.^[20] When he was in the eighth grade, the Mothers Club at the school used proceeds from Lakeside School's rummage sale to buy a Teletype Model 33 ASR terminal and a block of computer time on a General Electric (GE) computer for the school's students.^[21] Gates took an interest in programming the GE system in BASIC, and was excused from math classes to pursue his interest. He wrote his first computer program on this machine: an implementation of tic-tac-toe that allowed users to play games against the computer. Gates was fascinated by the machine and how it would always execute software code perfectly. When he reflected back on that moment, he said, "There was just something neat about the machine."^[22] After the Mothers Club donation was exhausted, he and other students sought time on systems including DEC PDP minicomputers. One of these systems was a PDP-10 belonging to Computer Center Corporation (CCC), which banned four Lakeside students—Gates, Paul Allen, Ric Weiland, and Kent Evans—for the summer after it caught them exploiting bugs in the operating system to obtain free computer time.^[23]

At the end of the ban, the four students offered to find bugs in CCC's software in exchange for computer time. Rather than use the system via Teletype, Gates went to CCC's offices and studied source code for various programs that ran on the system, including programs in FORTRAN, LISP, and machine language. The arrangement with CCC continued until 1970, when the company went out of business. The following year, Information Sciences, Inc. hired the four Lakeside students to write a payroll program in COBOL, providing them computer time and royalties. After his administrators became aware of his programming abilities, Gates wrote the school's computer program to schedule students in classes. He modified the code so that he was placed in classes with mostly female students. He later stated that "it was hard to tear myself away from a machine at which I could so unambiguously demonstrate success."^[22] At age 17, Gates formed a venture with Allen, called Traf-O-Data, to make traffic counters based on the Intel 8008 processor.^[24] In early 1973, Bill Gates served as a congressional page in the U.S. House of Representatives.^[25]

Gates graduated from Lakeside School in 1973. He scored 1590 out of 1600 on the SAT^[26] and enrolled at Harvard College in the autumn of 1973.^[27] While at Harvard, he met Steve Ballmer, who later succeeded Gates as CEO of Microsoft.

The Poker Room in Currier House at Harvard University, in which Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer formed Microsoft

In his sophomore year, Gates devised an algorithm for pancake sorting as a solution to one of a series of unsolved problems^[28] presented in a combinatorics class by Harry Lewis, one of his professors. Gates's solution held the record as the fastest version for over thirty years;^[28][29] its successor is faster by only one percent.^[28] His solution was later formalized in a published paper in collaboration with Harvard computer scientist Christos Papadimitriou.^[30]

Gates did not have a definite study plan while a student at Harvard^[31] and spent a lot of time using the school's computers. Gates remained in contact with Paul Allen, and he joined him at Honeywell during the summer of 1974.^[32] The following year saw the release of the MITS Altair 8800 based on the Intel 8080 CPU, and Gates and Allen saw this as the opportunity to start their own computer software company.^[33] He had talked this decision over with his parents, who were supportive of him after seeing how much Gates wanted to start a company.^[31]

Microsoft[link]

BASIC[link]

MITS Altair 8800 Computer with 8-inch (200 mm) floppy disk system

After reading the January 1975 issue of Popular Electronics that demonstrated the Altair 8800, Gates contacted Micro Instrumentation and Telemetry Systems (MITS), the creators of the new microcomputer, to inform them that he and others were working on a BASIC interpreter for the platform.^[34] In reality, Gates and Allen did not have an Altair and had not written code for it; they merely wanted to gauge MITS's interest. MITS president Ed Roberts agreed to meet them for a demo, and over the course of a few weeks they developed an Altair emulator that ran on a minicomputer, and then the BASIC interpreter. The demonstration, held at MITS's offices in Albuquerque was a success and resulted in a deal with MITS to distribute the interpreter as Altair BASIC. Paul Allen was hired into MITS,^[35] and Gates took a leave of absence from Harvard to work with Allen at MITS in Albuquerque in November 1975. They named their partnership "Micro-Soft" and had their first office located in Albuquerque.^[35] Within a year, the hyphen was dropped, and on November 26, 1976, the trade name "Microsoft" was registered with the Office of the Secretary of the State of New Mexico.^[35] Gates never returned to Harvard to complete his studies.

Microsoft's BASIC was popular with computer hobbyists, but Gates discovered that a pre-market copy had leaked into the community and was being widely copied and distributed. In February 1976, Gates wrote an Open Letter to Hobbyists in the MITS newsletter saying that MITS could not continue to produce, distribute, and maintain high-quality software without payment.^[36] This letter was unpopular with many computer hobbyists, but Gates persisted in his belief that software developers should be able to demand payment. Microsoft became independent of MITS in late 1976, and it continued to develop programming language software for various systems.^[35] The company moved from Albuquerque to its new home in Bellevue, Washington on January 1, 1979, after the former rejected his loan application.^[34]

During Microsoft's early years, all employees had broad responsibility for the company's business. Gates oversaw the business details, but continued to write code as well. In the first five years, Gates personally reviewed every line of code the company shipped, and often rewrote parts of it as he saw fit.^[37]

IBM partnership[link]

IBM approached Microsoft in July 1980 regarding its upcoming personal computer, the IBM PC.^[38] The computer company first proposed that Microsoft write the BASIC interpreter. When IBM's representatives mentioned that they needed an operating system, Gates referred them to Digital Research (DRI), makers of the widely used CP/M operating system.^[39] IBM's discussions with Digital Research went poorly, and they did not reach a licensing agreement. IBM representative Jack Sams mentioned the licensing difficulties during a subsequent meeting with Gates and told him to get an acceptable operating system. A few weeks later Gates proposed using 86-DOS (QDOS), an operating system similar to CP/M that Tim Paterson of Seattle Computer Products (SCP) had made for hardware similar to the PC. Microsoft made a deal with SCP to become the exclusive licensing agent, and later the full owner, of 86-DOS. After adapting the operating system for the PC, Microsoft delivered it to IBM as PC-DOS in exchange for a one-time fee of $50,000.^[40]

Gates did not offer to transfer the copyright on the operating system, because he believed that other hardware vendors would clone IBM's system.^[40] They did, and the sales of MS-DOS made Microsoft a major player in the industry.^[41] Despite IBM's name on the operating system the press quickly identified Microsoft as being very influential on the new computer, with PC Magazine asking if Gates were "The Man Behind The Machine?"^[38] He oversaw Microsoft's company restructuring on June 25, 1981, which re-incorporated the company in Washington state and made Gates President of Microsoft and the Chairman of the Board.^[34]

Windows[link]

Microsoft launched its first retail version of Microsoft Windows on November 20, 1985, and in August, the company struck a deal with IBM to develop a separate operating system called OS/2. Although the two companies successfully developed the first version of the new system, mounting creative differences caused the partnership to deteriorate. It ended in 1991, when Gates led Microsoft to develop a version of OS/2 independently from IBM.^[42]

Management style[link]

From Microsoft's founding in 1975 until 2006, Gates had primary responsibility for the company's product strategy. He aggressively broadened the company's range of products, and wherever Microsoft achieved a dominant position he vigorously defended it. He gained a reputation for being distant to others; as early as 1981 an industry executive complained in public that "Gates is notorious for not being reachable by phone and for not returning phone calls."^[43]

As an executive, Gates met regularly with Microsoft's senior managers and program managers. Firsthand accounts of these meetings describe him as verbally combative, berating managers for perceived holes in their business strategies or proposals that placed the company's long-term interests at risk.^[44][45] He often interrupted presentations with such comments as, "That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard!"^[46] and, "Why don't you just give up your options and join the Peace Corps?"^[47] The target of his outburst then had to defend the proposal in detail until, hopefully, Gates was fully convinced.^[46] When subordinates appeared to be procrastinating, he was known to remark sarcastically, "I'll do it over the weekend."^[48][49][50]

Gates's role at Microsoft for most of its history was primarily a management and executive role. However, he was an active software developer in the early years, particularly on the company's programming language products. He has not officially been on a development team since working on the TRS-80 Model 100,^[51] but wrote code as late as 1989 that shipped in the company's products.^[49] On June 15, 2006, Gates announced that he would transition out of his day-to-day role over the next two years to dedicate more time to philanthropy. He divided his responsibilities between two successors, placing Ray Ozzie in charge of day-to-day management and Craig Mundie in charge of long-term product strategy.^[52]

Antitrust litigation[link]

Bill Gates giving his deposition at Microsoft on August 27, 1998

Many decisions that led to antitrust litigation over Microsoft's business practices have had Gates's approval. In the 1998 United States v. Microsoft case, Gates gave deposition testimony that several journalists characterized as evasive. He argued with examiner David Boies over the contextual meaning of words such as, "compete", "concerned", and "we".^[53] BusinessWeek reported:

Early rounds of his deposition show him offering obfuscatory answers and saying 'I don't recall,' so many times that even the presiding judge had to chuckle. Worse, many of the technology chief's denials and pleas of ignorance were directly refuted by prosecutors with snippets of e-mail that Gates both sent and received.^[54]

Gates later said he had simply resisted attempts by Boies to mischaracterize his words and actions. As to his demeanor during the deposition, he said, "Did I fence with Boies? ... I plead guilty. Whatever that penalty is should be levied against me: rudeness to Boies in the first degree."^[55] Despite Gates's denials, the judge ruled that Microsoft had committed monopolization and tying, and blocking competition, both in violation of the Sherman Antitrust Act.^[55]

Appearance in ads[link]

Gates appeared in a series of ads to promote Microsoft in 2008. The first commercial, co-starring Jerry Seinfeld, is a 90-second talk between strangers as Seinfeld walks up on a discount shoe store (Shoe Circus) in a mall and notices Gates buying shoes inside. The salesman is trying to sell Mr. Gates shoes that are a size too big. As Gates is buying the shoes, he holds up his discount card, which uses a slightly altered version of his own mugshot of his arrest in New Mexico in 1977 for a traffic violation.^[56] As they are walking out of the mall, Seinfeld asks Gates if he has melded his mind to other developers, after getting a yes, he then asks if they are working on a way to make computers edible, again getting a yes. Some say that this is an homage to Seinfeld's own show about "nothing" (Seinfeld).^[57] In a second commercial in the series, Gates and Seinfeld are at the home of an average family trying to fit in with normal people.

Post-Microsoft[link]

Since leaving day-to-day operations at Microsoft (where he remains Chairman^[58]), Gates continues his philanthropy and, among other projects, purchased the video rights to the Messenger Lectures series called The Character of Physical Law, given at Cornell University by Richard Feynman in 1964 and recorded by the BBC. The videos are available online to the public at Microsoft's Project Tuva.^[59][60]

In April 2010, Gates was invited to visit and speak at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology where he asked the students to take on the hard problems of the world in their futures.^[61][62]

Personal life[link]

Bill and Melinda Gates, June 2009

Gates married Melinda French on January 1, 1994. They have two daughters, Jennifer Katharine Gates (1996) and Phoebe Adele (2002), and one son, Rory John (1999).

The Gates's home is an earth-sheltered house in the side of a hill overlooking Lake Washington in Medina. According to King County public records, as of 2006 the total assessed value of the property (land and house) is $125 million, and the annual property tax is $991,000.

His 66,000 sq ft (6,100 m²) estate has a 60-foot (18 m) swimming pool with an underwater music system, as well as a 2,500 sq ft (230 m²) gym and a 1,000 sq ft (93 m²) dining room.^[63]

Also among Gates's private acquisitions is the Codex Leicester, a collection of writings by Leonardo da Vinci, which Gates bought for $30.8 million at an auction in 1994.^[64] Gates is also known as an avid reader, and the ceiling of his large home library is engraved with a quotation from The Great Gatsby.^[65] He also enjoys playing bridge, tennis, and golf.^[66][67]

Gates was number one on the Forbes 400 list from 1993 through to 2007 and number one on Forbes list of The World's Richest People from 1995 to 2007 and 2009. In 1999, Gates's wealth briefly surpassed $101 billion, causing the media to call him a "centibillionaire".^[68] Since 2000, the nominal value of his Microsoft holdings has declined due to a fall in Microsoft's stock price after the dot-com bubble burst and the multi-billion dollar donations he has made to his charitable foundations. In a May 2006 interview, Gates commented that he wished that he were not the richest man in the world because he disliked the attention it brought.^[69] Gates has several investments outside Microsoft, which in 2006 paid him a salary of $616,667 and $350,000 bonus totalling $966,667.^[70] He founded Corbis, a digital imaging company, in 1989. In 2004 he became a director of Berkshire Hathaway, the investment company headed by long-time friend Warren Buffett.^[71] In March 2010 Bill Gates was bumped down to the second wealthiest man behind Carlos Slim.

Philanthropy[link]

Gates (second from right) with Bono, Queen Rania of Jordan, Former British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, President Umaru Yar'Adua of Nigeria and other participants in a 'Call to Action on the Millennium Development Goals' during the Annual Meeting 2008 of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland

Gates began to appreciate the expectations others had of him when public opinion mounted suggesting that he could give more of his wealth to charity. Gates studied the work of Andrew Carnegie and John D. Rockefeller, and in 1994 sold some of his Microsoft stock to create the William H. Gates Foundation. In 2000, Gates and his wife combined three family foundations into one to create the charitable Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, which is the largest transparently operated charitable foundation in the world.^[72] The foundation allows benefactors access to information regarding how its money is being spent, unlike other major charitable organizations such as the Wellcome Trust.^[73][74] The generosity and extensive philanthropy of David Rockefeller has been credited as a major influence. Gates and his father met with Rockefeller several times, and modeled their giving in part on the Rockefeller family's philanthropic focus, namely those global problems that are ignored by governments and other organizations.^[75] As of 2007, Bill and Melinda Gates were the second-most generous philanthropists in America, having given over $28 billion to charity.^[76] They plan to eventually give 95% of their wealth to charity.^[77]

The foundation was at the same time criticized because it invests assets that it has not yet distributed with the exclusive goal of maximizing return on investment. As a result, its investments include companies that have been charged with worsening poverty in the same developing countries where the Foundation is attempting to relieve poverty. These include companies that pollute heavily, and pharmaceutical companies that do not sell into the developing world.^[78] In response to press criticism, the foundation announced in 2007 a review of its investments, to assess social responsibility.^[79] It subsequently canceled the review and stood by its policy of investing for maximum return, while using voting rights to influence company practices.^[80] The Gates Millennium Scholars program has been criticized for its exclusion of Caucasian students.^[81][82]

Gates's wife urged people to learn a lesson from the philanthropic efforts of the Salwen family, which had sold its home and given away half of its value, as detailed in The Power of Half.^[83] Gates and his wife invited Joan Salwen to Seattle to speak about what the family had done, and on December 9, 2010, Gates, investor Warren Buffett, and Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook's CEO) signed a promise they called the "Gates-Buffet Giving Pledge", in which they promised to donate to charity at least half of their wealth over the course of time.^[84][85][86]

Recognition[link]

In 1987, Gates was officially declared a billionaire in the pages of Forbes' 400 Richest People in America issue, just days before his 32nd birthday. As the world's youngest self-made billionaire, he was worth $1.25 billion, over $900 million more than he'd been worth the year before, when he'd debuted on the list.^[87]

Bill Gates and Steve Jobs at the fifth D: All Things Digital conference (D5) in 2007

Time magazine named Gates one of the 100 people who most influenced the 20th century, as well as one of the 100 most influential people of 2004, 2005, and 2006. Time also collectively named Gates, his wife Melinda and U2's lead singer Bono as the 2005 Persons of the Year for their humanitarian efforts.^[88] In 2006, he was voted eighth in the list of "Heroes of our time".^[89] Gates was listed in the Sunday Times power list in 1999, named CEO of the year by Chief Executive Officers magazine in 1994, ranked number one in the "Top 50 Cyber Elite" by Time in 1998, ranked number two in the Upside Elite 100 in 1999 and was included in The Guardian as one of the "Top 100 influential people in media" in 2001.^[90]

In 1994, he was honoured as the twentieth Distinguished Fellow of the British Computer Society. Gates has received honorary doctorates from Nyenrode Business Universiteit, Breukelen, The Netherlands, in 2000;^[91] the Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm, Sweden, in 2002; invited in 2003 to deliver the keynote address^[92] of the Golden Jubilee of the Indian Institute of Technology,held in San Jose, California;^[93] Waseda University, Tokyo, Japan, in 2005; Tsinghua University, Beijing, China, in April 2007;^[94] Harvard University in June 2007;^[95] the Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, in January 2008,^[96] and Cambridge University in June 2009.^[97] He was also made an honorary trustee of Peking University in 2007.^[98] Gates was also made an honorary Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire (KBE) by Queen Elizabeth II in 2005,^[99] in addition to having entomologists name the Bill Gates flower fly, Eristalis gatesi, in his honor.^[100]

In November 2006, he and his wife were awarded the Order of the Aztec Eagle for their philanthropic work around the world in the areas of health and education, particularly in Mexico, and specifically in the program "Un país de lectores".^[101] In October 2009, it was announced that Gates will be awarded the 2010 Bower Award for Business Leadership of The Franklin Institute for his achievements in business and for his philanthropic work. In 2010 he was honored with the Silver Buffalo Award by the Boy Scouts of America, its highest award for adults, for his service to youth.^[102]

In 2011, Bill Gates was ranked as the fifth most powerful person in the world, according to rankings by Forbes magazine.^[103]

Investments[link]

• Cascade Investments LLC, a private investment and holding company, incorporated in United States, is controlled by Bill Gates, and is headquartered in the city of Kirkland, Washington.
• bgC3, a new think-tank company founded by Bill Gates.
• Corbis, a digital image licensing and rights services company.
• TerraPower, a nuclear reactor design company.

Books and films[link]

To date, Bill Gates has authored two books. The Road Ahead, written with Microsoft executive Nathan Myhrvold and journalist Peter Rinearson, was published in November 1995, and it summarized the implications of the personal computing revolution and described a future profoundly changed by the arrival of a global information superhighway. Business @ the Speed of Thought was published in 1999, and discusses how business and technology are integrated, and shows how digital infrastructures and information networks can help getting an edge on the competition.

Gates has appeared in a number of documentaries, including the 2010 documentary film Waiting for "Superman",^[104] and the BBC documentary series The Virtual Revolution.

Gates was prominently featured in Pirates of Silicon Valley, a 1999 film which chronicles the rise of Apple and Microsoft from the early 1970s to 1997. He was portrayed by Anthony Michael Hall.

See also[link]

	Biography portal
	Microsoft portal

• List of billionaires (also see List of college dropout billionaires and List of wealthiest non-inflated historical figures)
• Paul Allen – Microsoft's co-founder, friend, and fellow billionaire
• Gary Kildall (October 25, 2004). "The Man Who Could Have Been Bill Gates". Bloomberg BusinessWeek. http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/04_43/b3905109_mz063.htm. Retrieved June 9, 2010. 

Books[link]

• Fridson, Martin (2001). How to Be a Billionaire: Proven Strategies from the Titans of Wealth. John Wiley & Sons. ISBN 0-471-41617-7. 
• Gates, Bill (1996). The Road Ahead. Penguin Books. ISBN 0-14-026040-4. 
• Lesinski, Jeanne M. (2006). Bill Gates (Biography (a & E)). A&E Television Networks. ISBN 0-8225-7027-0. 
• Manes, Stephen (1994). Gates: How Microsoft's Mogul Reinvented an Industry and Made Himself The Richest Man in America. Touchstone Pictures. ISBN 0-671-88074-8. 
• Wallace, James (1993). Hard Drive: Bill Gates and the Making of the Microsoft Empire. New York: HarperCollins Publishers. ISBN 0-471-56886-4. 

References[link]