Please write down which teachers you think should be replaced to make Hogwarts a better school.

Who should replace them, and why?

For the purposes of this thread, we can pretend that there is no curse on the Defense position.

Here are the teachers I think need replacing:

- Binns.
- Snape.
- Defense Professor.
- Trelawney.

Here's who I think should replace them:

- Elphias Doge should replace Binns. He's old, presumably well-educated and a close friend of Dumbledore. He most likely knows his stuff.

- Slughorn should replace Snape, both as a Potions teacher and head of Slytherin. I think his teaching abilities are showcased in the books enough to make this suggestion reasonable.

- Alastor Moody (the real one) should be the Defense Professor. Ex-Auror, war veteran, enough said.

- Firenze should replace Trelawney. Not only he knows much more about predicting the future, he's also clearly more competent and honest than Trelawney.

 

Don't know about Moody, he might be a bit too crazy and paranoid to let loose on eleven year olds. I think Remus Lupin did a good job.

Firenze... He would be better than Trelawney, but not ideal. I don't remember how exactly his lessons went down, but by his nature he has a completely different approach to the topic, which might be hard to understand for his students. He probably also uses methods that humans can't use and knows little about the wizards way of predicting the future. On the other hand he offers a different insight - I think he would be a good teacher for 6th and 7th years who continue Divination out of a real interest. Can't think of any other canon character that had any knowledge in that area though, so it seems the two of them are the only options.

 

Bins should be replaced by a historian. Youd don't need to be old to know history or teach it. But we don't know what kind of methodology is used by magical historians during their inquries and what is the value of the source material.

 

If fanfiction taught me anything, every member of staff should be replaced by AU!Harry summoned through a bizarre ritual to fight Voldemort.

Oh wait, that's retarded.

 

Moody should teach NEWT students, Lupin can teach lower years.

 

Since we're talking thought experiments here, not what makes for good fiction:

Dumbledore should be replaced by someone (anyone) with the capacity to manage effectively. Yes, he's a powerful wizard. Yes, he a good, if conflicted man. I concede that, but nobody can deny he's anything but ruinous as a Headmaster:

• He hires and protects incompetent professors (Snape, Binns, Trelawney).
• He fails to do any semblance of managing conflict among his staff.
• He plays favorites and eschews fairness when it suits him, thus irreparably harming staff morale.
• He doesn't manage risk effectively.
• He doesn't promote a safe work environment.
• He permits aggressive behavior and bullying.
• He does no succession planning for himself or his staff, including for the one staff position that must be replaced every year.
• He cheats on performance metrics (the points system) to get the outcomes he desires, not what the data present.
• Despite several complaints, he does nothing to resolve the hostile work environment endured by his staff.
• Blatant substance abuse (Trelawny) and illegal activities (Snape, Umbridge, Hagrid) are practiced "on the clock" by his staff with his knowledge and tacit blessing.
• Instead of team building, he plays his staff (and students) against one another. In fact, the school is structurally antagonistic to effective team building outside of small, tribal units.
• He repeatedly fails to listen to those around him, be they students, faculty, or staff members.

Pretty much all of this is Management 101 stuff, which he fails.

 

Perspicacity, while I generally agree with you, please stop with the "favoritism" and "cheating on the point system" complaints. Snape cheats on the point system, Dumbledore just balances it out.

Unlike many fanfic authors, I don't think McGonagall would make a good Headmistress. She's too passive. Due to the nature of the series, we don't have many competent adult characters, so it is hard to think of a suitable one. Tom Riddle would probably be a great Headmaster, if he wasn't insane. And Harry Potter, given time to grow into the position.

History - Florean Fortescue. IIRC, Rowling confirmed that he was a history buff, and he did help Harry with his homework. Bathilda Bagshot, if she wasn't so old, could also fit.

Sybil Trelawny is a good teacher and seer, though she has the disadvantage of not being taken seriously by most students (Thanks, McGonagall!). She should remain on staff.

Remus Lupin or Harry Potter for DADA. Both would probably make a better Head of Gryffindor than McGonagall, seeing as they are much better at connecting with children, and would take a more active role at managing the House than she did.

Slughorn for Potions and Slytherin Head of House.

 

Hagrid should be replaced as well, imo. While I do like him as a character, he simply was not a good teacher. His teaching methods were neither effective nor safe (Buckbeak - I know that part of it was because Malfoy was an ass, but still a professor should have made sure that the students would be in no harm). Not to mention his "shady" activities (Nobert, Breeding of Blast-Ended Skrewts, Gwarp) or taste in dangerous creatures, which often leads to even more danger.

Grubby-Plank would have been a better professor for Care of Magical Creatures, as she was said to be very competent in her subject, even to the point where she easily passed Umbridge's inspection. It's also stated that most of the students (of all houses) preferred Grubby-Plank over Hagrid.

 

Xandrel, I know we're arguing about friggin' books here and not real life, but since you seem to take it at least semi-seriously, remember that knowledge of history does not a history teacher make. Binns knew a lot about goblin rebellions (ya know, history), but he was a crap teacher. We know very little of Elphias Doge (not Dodge), he could be a worse teacher than Snape. You might as well create an OC. Or maybe write Doge as a competent teacher, take your pick.

Of your choices, Slughorn is the only one I would actually agree with. If you want experience talking in the classroom, I think someone like Kingsley would be better than Moody (less weird). Firenze was hired by Dumbledore because he would've been killed by his fellow horsemen otherwise, not on competence. Nuff said.

"Everybody does it, so instead of uprooting the practice of dickery, I'll be a right dick back. That solves the problem, right?" :facepalm

 

My post was sort of tongue-in-cheek, but fine, let's unpack this:

Lovely. So instead of doing the right thing, instituting a fair points system and dealing with the problem of Snape's bias, he does the most wrong thing possible from a leadership standpoint: ignore the bias and publicly inject his own bias into the system to overturn the rankings, thereby putting a management imprimatur on the act of gaming the system. Way to go, Dumbledore, way to disempower everyone, proving that it's not one's own actions and merits and ambitions that matter, but rather executive fiat.

Leaders rise above and effect positive change, accepting and understanding the consequences of their bad decisions and seeking to avoid making them in the future. Dumbledore is quite the opposite. His management style is utterly at odds with his stated values ("It is our choices, Harry..."), which makes me wonder if this is all a bit of a joke on JKR's part.

You should be lucky if you never work for a manager as bad as Dumbledore.

 

Oh, I'm definitely lucky. I do think Dumbledore goes about managing in the school (and other matters) in all the wrong ways, but the point granting is the least problematic of them, is at least somewhat justified, and is often blown out of proportion.

 

Those activities have nothing to do with his teaching so I don't think they're relevant to this debate. He would still try to raise dragons or Screwts if he wasn't a teacher. But I do agree Grubbly-Plank would probably be a better choice.
Although please, don't talk about Umbridge's inspections. The only reason she passed is because she was replacing Hagrid, that's all.

I can't believe nobody proposed Lily as Potions teacher. Bad fanfics aside, she's something of a genius in Potions and she's not Snape, so what's to ask?

I'm not sure Slughorn would be that great. He's obviously very competent and has a gift to recognize talent, but he plays favorites as much as Snape. He just favorizes promising students instead of Slytherins. I'm not sure it's a good thing to not even care what's the name of your students if they're not geniuses, especially in younger years.

 

Arthur Weasley, Muggle studies professor. Not because he knows much about muggles, but the class would at least be hilarious.

 

"Now... who can tell me the purpose of a rubber duck?"

 

Those activities have quite a lot to do with his teaching. They put the lives of his students at risk and if he can't realize that, he has no business being even closer to students as a teacher than he is as a Groundskeeper.

 

Shouldn't Divination be scrapped entirely? Wasn't half the point that it couldn't be taught.

 

That's like scrapping art class.Everyone can draw useless doodles but only a few can draw actual art.

 

I feel like having different teachers for different years, such as Lupin teacher 1-4 years and Moody teaching 5-7 would be easier because it would allow those teachers to focus more and not be so spread thin

 

It's long been established that a Hogwarts timetable is impossible unless Professors use Time-Turners. It's a plot hole so big it's better left ignored.

 

I'm fairly certain anybody with enough time and effort can learn to draw eventually. In Harry Potter only those who possess the gift can predict the future. Dumbledore admits he was thinking of scrapping it.