Teachers FLOCK to Michigan- 4th Highest Paid (Detroit, Flint: teaching jobs, public schools)
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6. Dump unnecessary tenure meant to protect college professors writing and teaching controversial subject matter, etc....(and while you are at it, dump the silly little credits you all have to obtain with your own money and start a national internet based system of seminars that address real world school issues and new subject matter...and dump the whole "masters degree = $6,000-$8,000 raise" for high school teachers...instead pay those who teach more difficult classes such as Calc more money, and those teaching ABCs and poster making less money...let capitalism work, as supply and demand should drive salary, not "I've been here 'X' years unionized nonsense". Stick with the unions, and end up being a Gm/Ford entity verus Toyota/Honda...as it is only a matter the private schools sector gets noticed by the majority and the public school systems go the way of the dinosaurs...[/quote]
OK I like your idea of paying teachers who teach more difficult subjects more money, but right there is a problem. Who gets to teach those higher subjects? What about in smaller school districts where only a handful of kids, not 30-40 like a typical class, are ready for the subject material of physics and calculus? Which teacher gets to teach those kids.
Also, should a teacher who deals with the more difficult kids get paid more? Isn't their job harder. I remember Calculus in high school. The homework was always done and ready and the kids WANTED to learn. Algebra was the hard subject because all of the lazy unmotivated kids with uninvolved parents were in there making it horrible to teach.
So you tell the teachers that not only does the calculus teacher get the students that are more rewarding to work with, but he also gets more money? You're gonna get faster turnover than you already have (I believe 50 % of teachers quit after 3 years, or that was the statistic they gave us in college I quit after 2)
Here''s the major problem with public education 1 teacher 30 kids ( all with their own issues and their own ability levels) and in the upper grades they get 60 minutes to teach them. Thats 2 minutes of attention for each one. You get just 1 or 2 kids that don't get enough attention at home and they will disrupt class the whole time. Then throw in the high stakes testing to worry about, the constant ridicule from outsiders on how the system could do better if it was privatized or charter schools. Its not worth it for $30,000 a year.
I quit after 2 years, I was a music and math teacher in Arizona. I quit because as a music teacher the administration expected me to simply babysit the kids so the other teachers could have a prep time. As a math teacher, it was drilling for standardized tests. I have seen how 1 or 2 bad kids in a class can ruin the whole class and waste instructional time.
My year to year raise was $250. Why should I stay in when my salary doesn't even keep up with inflation and administration policies and bad parenting make me wanna go home and eat a bottle of asprin.
I know with a little bit of professional support and time I could've built up a great band program, but it wasn't worth the stress to stay in the profession and eat ramen every night. I have no regrets about leaving.
Unfortunately any system of pay raises based on merit or difficulty of subject matter will probably fail because teachers will be trying to draft high ability kids or fighting for difficult subject matter and those low ability kids will be even further neglected.
The motive behind the yearly salary schedule is that it keeps good teachers that are given hard students in the field and they gain experience and they learn how to deal with kids better. Teachers will not constantly be fighting like scavengers over the high ability level students because having a low ability level class will not affect their paycheck.
People keep complaining about a lack of accountability, what if we hold parents accountable? If their child doesn't pass the standardized test that we all hold so dear, then they can't use that child as a tax exemption? I bet parents will be helping out on homework a lot more. I bet they'll be checking to make sure its done and that their child is behaving.
Even better, if the child doesn't get the homework done, the parents are fined $10. Not for wasting the teachers time, but for wasting the classes time because that student has not practiced/reinforced the concepts learned in class and more time will be spent in review.
Now heres how to do the pay raises for teachers.
If the teacher gets a child to pass the standardized tests (which we all hold so dear) the teacher gets all of the homework fines charged to that child. If the teacher gets the whole class to pass then they should get a major raise.
I know thats a warped twisted idea but its at least an idea.
Teachers are not the only ones that should be held accountable for the the child though, parents need to be as well. Heck, if the parents employers give the parents hours that leave the kids home alone then we need to find a way to hold the employers accountable as well. EVERYONE needs to be held accountable in the education of our children.
Wow that was long, sorry for the lengthy reply and the weird idea, guess I'm just bored.
Wrong. Try teaching in a year round school and being on off track
Sure ya do... what school would that be???
I highly doubt you are part of a school that is in the teachers union and going year round. There is only one I know of in Michigan that just opened and it was clear when they opened it was the only year round school. Unless you are part of the Innocademy. I do not believe you for one second.
The only reason they get away with it in the union is because their students are "traveling" students, which means their parents have jobs that make them travel for weeks at a time. This school allows the children to go with their parents while staying in school.
Last edited by joedekock; 10-23-2007 at 07:03 AM..
I highly doubt you are part of a school that is in the teachers union and going year round. There is only one I know of in Michigan that just opened and it was clear when they opened it was the only year round school. Unless you are part of the Innocademy in Zeeland, MI, I do not believe you for one second.
The only reason they get away with it in the union is because their students are "traveling" students, which means their parents have jobs that make them travel for weeks at a time. This school allows the children to go with their parents while staying in school.
Alright highlandGal... I am calling you out. you say you work for a year round school. However, after reading some of your other posts on this site, I was able to very quickly determine that you live in Colorado and work for the Douglas County school district which is in Denver. You moved there from Michigan, and just by googling your user name, you have a profile on a singles dating service website that says you are 37 years old and a teacher. (Although this may not be you unless you at one point lived, or are looking for love in Louisville Kentucky).
Anyway, your school calender, (which is linked below for everyone to see), clearly states that your district does not have school, nor are teachers to report the entire months of June and July. While your school district starts three weeks earlier than Michigan, they dismiss for the year a week earlier. And your district has a full week for "Fall Break" in the middle of October which you just came off of. That would explain why you have not posted at all last week. Because you were off of school... now that it is back in session, we should see more posts from you on school time right?
So you do not work more than a teacher in Michigan, and you certainly do not work year round. Are you teaching your kids how to lie highlandsGal??? That's a good quality that will prepare them for a successful life.
I am sorry to say highlandGal, that you have been found to be a liar. I have no respect for anyone who is a liar, cheat or a thief. If you are one of those, you are all, because it takes every one of those disgusting qualifications to be any of the others.
It sickens me that someone like you is a teacher. Not only do you lie to us on this forum about your job to back your argument, but also in your very first post on this thread you insinuate a person disagreeing with your view is unintelligent and not as "educated" as you. You were wrong to say that to that poster, because you are the uneducated one if you believe you have to lie to win an argument.
So keep complaining about your low salary, and your awful benefits, and how much work you have to do. You went to college to be a teacher. Did not know how much money a teacher made when you were working on your degree??? If not... then you are a fool. To me it seems like you are not that busy if you can keep posting during school hours.
You took all of us including me in your posts and replies to be fools. Here is the proof of who is the real fool.
Do me a favor and stay out of Michigan!!! I really would not want you to teach my children! You are the kind of bad teacher everyone here is talking about.
I hope you learned a lesson today. If you are going to continue to be a liar, be careful what you post on the internet. It was easy to connect the dots based on what you post. If you want your life to be private then don't be stupid on forums or blog sites.
To the moderators: I know this may seem like a personal attack, but I believe it is done tastefully, and with more respect than the user who this is directed toward has shown all of us. I hope you will not edit or delete it. Thank you!
Last edited by joedekock; 10-23-2007 at 07:11 AM..
Alright highlandGal... I am calling you out. you say you work for a year round school. However, after reading some of your other posts on this site, I was able to very quickly determine that you live in Colorado and work for the Douglas County school district which is in Denver. You moved there from Michigan, and just by googling your user name, you have a profile on a singles dating service website that says you are 37 years old and a teacher. (Although this may not be you unless you at one point lived, or are looking for love in Louisville Kentucky).
Anyway, your school calender, (which is linked below for everyone to see), clearly states that your district does not have school, nor are teachers to report the entire months of June and July. While your school district starts three weeks earlier than Michigan, they dismiss for the year a week earlier. And your district has a full week for "Fall Break" in the middle of October which you just came off of. That would explain why you have not posted at all last week. Because you were off of school... now that it is back in session, we should see more posts from you on school time right?
So you do not work more than a teacher in Michigan, and you certainly do not work year round. Are you teaching your kids how to lie highlandsGal??? That's a good quality that will prepare them for a successful life.
Here's the link for all of the calendars my district follows:
I am sorry to say highlandGal, that you have been found to be a liar. I have no respect for anyone who is a liar, cheat or a thief. If you are one of those, you are all, because it takes every one of those disgusting qualifications to be any of the others.
It sickens me that someone like you is a teacher. Not only do you lie to us on this forum about your job to back your argument, but also in your very first post on this thread you insinuate a person disagreeing with your view is unintelligent and not as "educated" as you. You were wrong to say that to that poster, because you are the uneducated one if you believe you have to lie to win an argument.
So keep complaining about your low salary, and your awful benefits, and how much work you have to do. You went to college to be a teacher. Did not know how much money a teacher made when you were working on your degree??? If not... then you are a fool. To me it seems like you are not that busy if you can keep posting during school hours.
You took all of us including me in your posts and replies to be fools. Here is the proof of who is the real fool.
Do me a favor and stay out of Michigan!!! I really would not want you to teach my children! You are the kind of bad teacher everyone here is talking about.
I hope you learned a lesson today. If you are going to continue to be a liar, be careful what you post on the internet. It was easy to connect the dots based on what you post. If you want your life to be private then don't be stupid on forums or blog sites.
To the moderators: I know this may seem like a personal attack, but I believe it is done tastefully, and with more respect than the user who this is directed toward has shown all of us. I hope you will not edit or delete it. Thank you!
woh dude! you are a crazy guy with too much time on your hands!! Yes I do work for Douglas County in Colorado and yes a lot of the schools here ARE year round...I happen to work at one (check out the elementary and alternative calendars - duh?), and guess what, I am not part of the union!!
And for the record, this name was picked randomly and I have never lived in or around Kentucky or done online dating.
You are a crazy stalker with a major chip on your shoulder. And yes, I am posting this on my prep hour weirdo!! Don't you work??? You seem to spend all of your time looking up so-called "facts" about me and calling me a liar when you really know nothing about me.
I love my job here and I am more than happy with my pay and benefits here. Sure beats what I made in Michigan
Here's the link for all of the calendars my school district follows:
woh dude! you are a crazy guy with too much time on your hands!! Yes I do work for Douglas County in Colorado and yes a lot of the schools here ARE year round...I happen to work at one (check out the elementary and alternative calendars - duh?), and guess what, I am not part of the union!!
And for the record, this name was picked randomly and I have never lived in or around Kentucky or done online dating.
You are a crazy stalker with a major chip on your shoulder. And yes, I am posting this on my prep hour weirdo!! Don't you work??? You seem to spend all of your time looking up so-called "facts" about me and calling me a liar when you really know nothing about me.
I love my job here and I am more than happy with my pay and benefits here. Sure beats what I made in Michigan
Here's the link for all of the calendars my school district follows:
I am terribly sorry for overlooking the first time that there are not year round schools. Please forgive me for calling you a liar.
I am not a crazy stalker. A stalker is someone who would follow you around. What you post on the internet is public information. I smelled something fishy. By using the search features on this forum, I was able to determine within five minuets where you lived and work. That is your own unintellectual decisions that led me to that. But it turns out there is nothing fishy there.
I work as a Network Engineer that services small and medium sized business' computer networks. Everything from security, servers, data management, and end user hardware and software support. I have not "set hours". A lot of the work we do has to be done when the business' are closed as to not interrupt their work. So I may work 7am-5pm one day, 6am-8pm another, or 2pm-11am on yet a different day. I end up on average with 45 hours a week.
Anyway, again, please accept my apologies. But like I tell my kids. If you do not like your personal life to be known to any stranger do not post it on the internet.
P.S.
I give you a lot more credit than the average teacher, for working at a year round school. I think that should be the next step in public school education.
And no, I do not have a chip on my shoulder. I just care about the future of America, and truly see the public school system as a big problem with it. There is always room for improvement.
Yes of course the public school system has room for improvement, but taking kids in a public school system and placing them in a private system and expecting the wonders of privatization to work their magic on it and everything will be fine is a mistake.
A public school takes in anybody, thats what a public education is. All the problem kids, and disabled kids are taken in and not turned away. All the kids with uninvolved parents go in and wreak havoc in their quest for attention while taking away from class time.
What would happen if vouchers were instituted and all of the parents decided to send their kids to private schools, do you really think the schools can handle that kind of a change in population? What about the student to teacher ratio? Are the parents suddenly going to become more involved? Vouchers and switching over to privatizing won't fix this.
I also worked at a school with a year round schedule. In my two years there in 4 parent teacher conferences I saw 10 parents total. 10! I saw 200 students a day and only 10 parents.
If you REALLY want to see the system fixed, then figure out how to get parents involved. Knowing that a great number of my kids went home to an empty house for a few hours, maybe parents should be working a different schedule, maybe we shouldn't be a 24/7 culture/economy. I don't know if there's been a study on it but I'm willing to bet that as we kept businesses open longer and longer and more days of the week, I bet divorce rates and latchkey kids increased, but thats another thread I suppose. Yes I am a liberal, but I just rarely see times when economics and family values (by family values I mean time with family, sitting down for dinner together at the table, reading together, family activities) see eye to eye.
A teacher can't fix in the 7-8 hour school day 5 days a week what the family could be doing wrong the rest of the time (let the kid sit around and watch TV all the time, let the kid constantly fight with siblings or bully siblings). Family and parents MUST be involved and we need to adjust our culture in order to do so. Otherwise, we can start looking to China or India to take the reigns as the #1 superpower.
Yes of course the public school system has room for improvement, but taking kids in a public school system and placing them in a private system and expecting the wonders of privatization to work their magic on it and everything will be fine is a mistake.
A public school takes in anybody, thats what a public education is. All the problem kids, and disabled kids are taken in and not turned away. All the kids with uninvolved parents go in and wreak havoc in their quest for attention while taking away from class time.
What would happen if vouchers were instituted and all of the parents decided to send their kids to private schools, do you really think the schools can handle that kind of a change in population? What about the student to teacher ratio? Are the parents suddenly going to become more involved? Vouchers and switching over to privatizing won't fix this.
I also worked at a school with a year round schedule. In my two years there in 4 parent teacher conferences I saw 10 parents total. 10! I saw 200 students a day and only 10 parents.
If you REALLY want to see the system fixed, then figure out how to get parents involved. Knowing that a great number of my kids went home to an empty house for a few hours, maybe parents should be working a different schedule, maybe we shouldn't be a 24/7 culture/economy. I don't know if there's been a study on it but I'm willing to bet that as we kept businesses open longer and longer and more days of the week, I bet divorce rates and latchkey kids increased, but thats another thread I suppose. Yes I am a liberal, but I just rarely see times when economics and family values (by family values I mean time with family, sitting down for dinner together at the table, reading together, family activities) see eye to eye.
A teacher can't fix in the 7-8 hour school day 5 days a week what the family could be doing wrong the rest of the time (let the kid sit around and watch TV all the time, let the kid constantly fight with siblings or bully siblings). Family and parents MUST be involved and we need to adjust our culture in order to do so. Otherwise, we can start looking to China or India to take the reigns as the #1 superpower.
I agree.
Today my principal and I were trying to think up ways to get more parents to conferences (which are coming up next month at my school). We have a total of 12 hours set aside for confrences in an effort to accommodate parents' work schedules, but year after year we only see a tiny fraction of our parents. And of course the ones we DO see aren't the ones we really NEED to see.
So we were thinking of doing a dinner or having raffles or something "fun" to draw the families in. I understand that school can be an intimidating place for some parents (especially if they had bad school experiences themselves) and if having a more "carnival-like" atmosphere works, then great...but isn't it a bit sad that we have to resort to "bribing" our parents just to get them to come in and discuss their childrens' education with us?
I doubt they have to do this at most private schools.
Well, since you're not a teacher, you have NO CLUE how hard or not hard education classes are. Also, has it ever occured to you that teachers are required to go back to school all the time to get new required credits, etc. And come on, people may be sick or dying, but the people that deal with them account for like 3% of the entire workforce. What do you do that makes you so special? I'm usually a very patient person (which is exactly what it takes to be a teacher, especially dealing with the populations of kids I work with who need a lot of love and help that has nothing to do with the content areas I teach), but you want to tell me that a whole year of planning would take 1 WEEK?! I teach summer school, work as a voluteer basketball coach, and am on 4 committees that take an obscene amount of time and I guarantee I don't do it for the money. I do it because I love kids, I love teaching, I love actually having a positive impact on the 150 students I teach daily, and I don't mind the 32,000 I get paid, but I do mind when ignorant people like yourself tell me that I get paid to much, am a glorified babysitter, and should do something with my life the three months that I am not teaching.
Calm down jpoole52, i certainly dont think you are a glorified babysitter, you worked hard to get where you are. Someone quoted 100,000 to be a teacher, that is ridiculous because teachers have awesome insurance plans and many have pensions when they retire. That makes up for a large portion of the lack of payment when they are just starting. I by the way, am a doctor and there are many more than 3 percent of people caring for sick and dying people in the workforce.
I sure hope you are a doctor, because it is NOT easy by any stretch of the imagination!
Do you ever see a doctor physically exhausted when he's checking up on you for the two minutes he's usually looking over the clipboard? Is he covered in sweat as he tells you to "Open up and say, 'Ahhhhh'?"
So if a doctor isn't a physically demanding job, it must be a mentally tiring one, right?
You would think that because they're DOCTORS! They went to school for years! They are paid $100+/hr.!!! Of course they must be using their large craniums more than us simple folk!!!
WRONG.
You assume because a person has a degree that involved more school work than perhaps what you had that they are smarter than you...that they have to use their brains more than you. Couldn't it be that they just know their own profession really well through studying/practice/etc. (like you in whatever field you're in) and don't actually struggle with what they are working on very often? I mean, not every doctor is a brain surgeon folks. Nurses and Aides do most of the nitty-gritty stuff anyways, right? But if you talk Nurse vs. Doctor, people have very little respect for the nurses because in medicine, you're a doctor or a nobody.
Doctors' "elite status" comes from their own manipulation of the healthcare industry by making patients think their time is more valuable than the sick peoples' and is more difficult as well.
If your average Doctor in a hospital truly had the weight of the world on his/her shoulders every single day, you'd see doctors committing suicide left and right. In stead you see the opposite: Doctors playing golf, going on monthly vacations, owning multiple homes and having fancy cars. Most don't even work a standard M-F 40hr. week.
And yes, I still hold firm to the belief that if everyone in this country HAD THE OPPORTUNITY TO 100% PURSUE ANY DEGREE THEY WANTED W/O FEAR OF RUNNING OUT OF TUITION $$$ (even if it means govt. loans), tons and tons of people would aim for those lawyer/doctor jobs.
It's just many people (especially when they're 17/18) don't want to commit to a 7+ year degree they might not finish due to financial reasons.
Yeah I'm sure a lot more people would become doctors and lawyers if they could afford the cost of schooling. Wouldn't that be wonderful.
Lets think of some other wonderful things
Everyone could put in a 40 hour work week and be able to afford a place to live because most jobs are hard or provide some useful service they wouldn't need two jobs to pay for housing, food and other necessities.
We could grow food and make sure its healthy for consumption and not filled with e coli. or other disease and our toys aren't filled with lead.
Everyone would bike to work, healthier and less pollution.
I could keep going but that was a pointless post and an argument irrelevant to the original intent of the thread.
Start a thread complaining about people who don't do deserve all the money they make. (I'd personally go with stockbrokers and CEOs)
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