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"Put up with" were your own words on the previous post. Hence my use of quotations.
Teachers "put up with" all the negative aspects of the profession, most of which have been delved into in this thread, because the internal rewards cannot be matched in any field. To a good teacher, the few students on which they do make a positive, lifelong impact are well worth all the bull that teachers "put up with."
Speak for yourself I know a heck of a lot of teachers who individually have positively impacted a heck of a lot of kids over their careers and have awards and continuing good community support to prove it. I am sorry if your career is not as positive as mine, my wife and many of our colleagues. Many people in other fields consider their internal rewards to be unmatched. It is up to the individual to value their field of work and hopefully they value it highly. Very few of the good teachers I know felt they were putting up with crap. If you are that is unfortunate and I trust you will remedy the situation.
I have to agree with you, simply because most good teachers don't leave the profession.
Actually many very good and great teachers leave the profession because of very lousy administrators and administration and all the BS that goes with teaching.
This is a pretty standard argument that teachers use to divert blame away from themselves. The fact is the educational system spends more time with children nowadays that the parents do. And 100% of that time is spent in instruction. While I do not hold parents blameless, the truth is by the time they get home from work, make sure everyone is fed, bathed, and homework is done, it is pretty much bedtime, which does not leave much time to do much in the way of teaching or installing values. To insinuate most of the problems with children come from being drug babies, neglected, molested, or malnourished is disingenuous at best. Most kids just come from a situation where, since their mothers are working, no one has time for them and they are basically being raised by a dysfunctional education system. We are now in a downward spiral where the educational system is turning out under educated graduates, who in turn, do not do their duty as citizens because they do not understand their responsibilities as citizens, or how the government even works. The government easily manipulates the under educated populous, and sets the educational agenda to insure they are never held to task for their misdeeds. We have now sunk to a point where we have to import doctors and engineers, and our best economists think it is possible to borrow your way out of debt. At this point I believe the only way to begin to turn this around is for mothers to quit work, stay home and raise their children. They need be involved, and to hold the school systems feet to the fire about what and how their children are being taught in school. But that might mean they have to give up their SUV and their all important careers. I guess that is more important than their children and the future of the country, so it won’t happen
Help me with the math? A student is in school somewhere on average between 7-7 1/2 hours. They are in the house with their parents for more hours. The time spent in school is not 100% instructional if for no other reason than lunch and passing time. The time spent in class is not with one adult for the full time but with multiple adults usually one at a time or possibly two. They share that time with what 15-35 other students. So how much individual or small group interaction are they given with the same adult on a daily basis? Compare that with the worse parenting situation. Why can't parents share values with their kids while they are feeding, bathing and helping them with their homework? You excuse parents from doing this during one on one time with their child but expect a teacher to do it with dozens of other kids while also providing instruction? You appear to excuse dysfunctional parenting on the basis that work is a higher priority and when they get home they have other priorities? Yet you conclude by saying that parents need to be more accountable to their kids in holding schools feet to the fire. How about them holding their feet to the fire and parenting their kids like the millions of successful parents do!
Actually many very good and great teachers leave the profession because of very lousy administrators and administration and all the BS that goes with teaching.
Is that their excuse? Is that like the transfer of blame they warn students against? The average person until the recession changed jobs seven times during their career. Most of the time without fan fare or blame but to try something new and for advancement etc. Why is it when a teacher does the same thing they have to do so with so much drama? Yes many leave because they want another work environment or their career choice was no longer the right thing for them.
The difference may be in which budgets you are comparing. The operating budget which includes salaries or the operating and capital budgets combined, the capital budget is construction costs etc, not salaries and can have different revenue sources.
http://www.browardschools.com/press/pdf/budget_facts.pdf (broken link)
Speak for yourself I know a heck of a lot of teachers who individually have positively impacted a heck of a lot of kids over their careers and have awards and continuing good community support to prove it. I am sorry if your career is not as positive as mine, my wife and many of our colleagues. Many people in other fields consider their internal rewards to be unmatched. It is up to the individual to value their field of work and hopefully they value it highly. Very few of the good teachers I know felt they were putting up with crap. If you are that is unfortunate and I trust you will remedy the situation.
I am speaking for myself and many other teachers when I say the internal rewards of teaching cannot be matched in any field. Would we be good teachers if we believed the internal rewards were better somewhere else or were in someway not worthwhile? BTW, like you, I have had a very positive career, full of awards and community accolades as well, but I am not so jaded that I cannot identify a turd as a turd when I see one, nor or most other teachers. I suppose that if you were involved in some high-income district with close to 100% parental support or some other cushy district, in a previous decade, you might not believe that teachers "put up with" (your words) crap. But that is not reality for most teachers.
I am speaking for myself and many other teachers when I say the internal rewards of teaching cannot be matched in any field. Would we be good teachers if we believed the internal rewards were better somewhere else or were in someway not worthwhile? BTW, like you, I have had a very positive career, full of awards and community accolades as well, but I am not so jaded that I cannot identify a turd as a turd when I see one, nor or most other teachers. I suppose that if you were involved in some high-income district with close to 100% parental support or some other cushy district, in a previous decade, you might not believe that teachers "put up with" (your words) crap. But that is not reality for most teachers.
The reality that exists for you is the reality you selected when you applied.
This is a pretty standard argument that teachers use to divert blame away from themselves. The fact is the educational system spends more time with children nowadays that the parents do. And 100% of that time is spent in instruction. While I do not hold parents blameless, the truth is by the time they get home from work, make sure everyone is fed, bathed, and homework is done, it is pretty much bedtime, which does not leave much time to do much in the way of teaching or installing values. To insinuate most of the problems with children come from being drug babies, neglected, molested, or malnourished is disingenuous at best. Most kids just come from a situation where, since their mothers are working, no one has time for them and they are basically being raised by a dysfunctional education system. We are now in a downward spiral where the educational system is turning out under educated graduates, who in turn, do not do their duty as citizens because they do not understand their responsibilities as citizens, or how the government even works. The government easily manipulates the under educated populous, and sets the educational agenda to insure they are never held to task for their misdeeds. We have now sunk to a point where we have to import doctors and engineers, and our best economists think it is possible to borrow your way out of debt. At this point I believe the only way to begin to turn this around is for mothers to quit work, stay home and raise their children. They need be involved, and to hold the school systems feet to the fire about what and how their children are being taught in school. But that might mean they have to give up their SUV and their all important careers. I guess that is more important than their children and the future of the country, so it won’t happen
I guess fathers couldn't quit work and do the same?
How do you explain the success of Asian children, whose parents work (sometimes 2+ jobs) and are taught by those same public school teachers?
Wow, what a crazy thread. Face it, debating the value of teacher salaries in the abstract is like debating the existence of a particular God. Pointless and counterproductive.
Let's start with the premise that good teachers deserve more pay than they are now receiving and bad teachers less.
The top 10 questions then are... 1) how much more compensation?
>> My answer: enough to meet the objectives of the school
2) How are the teachers to be evaluated? and against what criteria? how often?
>> My answer: perhaps biannually with the bar increasing with the innovations in the field.
>> My answer: criteria set by the combination of the academic and professional frontier
3) What combination of compensation (salary, vacation, benefits, etc.)?
>> My answer: Offer a compensation-neutral selection menu. People have different preferences.
>> My answer: Again, enough to meet the criteria set by the school/program. You want the cutting edge, you will need to pay more.
4) What about probation/tenure?
>> My answer: Every five years. If teacher fails to make the grade, then teacher salary is cut by x% and sent into a junior pool but with opportunity to remake the grade.
5) What about promotion?
>> My answer: Depends on objectives. Just be clear and transparent to the community
6) what about retraining up training updates?
>> My answer: Required. Mandatory. Evaluations should always be current. It is in the best interest of schools, kids, and teachers.
7) What about control over working environs? (i.e. can they switch schools, teacher Preferred clases)?
>> My answer: Make this compensation-neutral. Better teachers can have first pick and can be awarded more choice and flexibility. But incentives should be set such that at the margin the decision between {package A, environs A} is roughly equal to {package B, environs B}
8) how to benchmark compensation?
>> My answer: Based on both the economic markets and the market value within the education world.
>> My answer: Failure to do so will violate #1 or make it very difficult.
9) How much discretion to leave in terms of awarding compensation?
>> My answer: Some in the form of bonuses. Otherwise, step increases can be one of the elements of a viable compensation package.
10) How transparent should the process be?
>> My answer: VERY. Right now, too much $$ passes under tables. It is undemocratic and undermines morale. Full transparency will take a bit of time to get used to. People hate to see colleagues making more $$, even if they themselves are lucky to have a job and the target of their wrath is invaluable to the school. However, it also gives a chance for systems to learn-by-doing.
You'll note that virtually all of the above would be rejected by teacher unions, not on merit but on undermining the current approach to collective bargaining taken by teacher unions. Fine. Then unions can take the lead if they so choose.
If they don't and administrators and politicians do not, then guess what? More and more kids from affluent and educated parents will exit the system. Lower pass rates on bonds. More legislation to cap spending on schools. Further decline in the lower quartile schools.
And greater concentrations of poverty and crime, some of which will affect you directly. Those heartless murderers, rapists, and drug dealers, you know, the ones with the blank eyes and blackened hearts? Well, they are manufactured goods...manufactured by a society that sentences them to a life of effective death and then has the gall to be shocked and surprised about their existence. Schooling is only one part of the solution, but it is a big part.
Logic and brass balls are the basis of all necessary actions in public education. Aside from the lady in Washington DC (who is doing OK, a "B"), I see no one willing to change conditions in this decrepit money pit in our most challenged systems of public education.
You are not going to convince me of anything, most of the people in my family are teachers. I grew up with multiple teachers and I know exactly what they do during summer, on breaks, etc; it rarely involves working.
Teachers do not work more hours per day than other professions.
By the way, I have worked as a "teacher" before. Just not in K-12.
Well, I know that just when I was student teaching, I was at the school at 6:30 and I didn't leave until 5 or 6. By the time I would get home and do all of the daily things I needed to do, it was say 8:30. I was teaching multiple classes that ranged from Algebra to Advanced Placement Chemistry. Just working on the AP chemistry papers and work would take 2 hours. And on top of all the grading and lesson plans, don't forget I was in a masters program and I was writing my thesis.
And I wasn't the only one, there are a lot of teachers that have the same kind of life. I think it was rare for me to go to bed before 12.
In the summer there are conferences and other courses to take. The true dedicated teachers work in the summer. If you're teaching in an affluent school, you probably don't have to do as much, but I was teaching at a magnet school in an urban city. There is much more work to be done, with much less in the way of resources.
Honestly, you discredit yourself when you mention you've never taught K-12.
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