Quote:
Originally Posted by SlackerInc
It was a stereotype back when I was growing up, but I would have liked to think that we had gotten past that hoary old idea in the 21st century. Instead, my wife got a secondary education/social studies master's degree after getting a master's in sociology, and discovered that schools were explicitly linking social studies teaching positions with coaching. I just couldn't believe this was even legal (it seems vaguely sexist); and it certainly cannot be what those who carry the torch of the social sciences at the university level want their field to be associated with.
Not that I'm a sports hater--in fact, I'm a fanatic about tennis and football, and don't mind basketball either--but the implication is that SS is sort of a blowoff, not anything academically serious, so something you just pass off to the coach. And then if someone with real SS credentials wants to actually teach it in a serious way, but does not happen to have an interest and/or aptitude for coaching, forget it.
Not only do I feel that it is wrong for schools to orient their hiring this way, I also think that so long as this is the case, university education departments should warn their students that if they go for a secondary social studies certificate but are not oriented toward coaching, they are likely to be heading for a dead-end careerwise.
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I graduated from high school in Ohio in '99 and at that time at my school there were I want to say 10 social studies teachers in the dept of which only 3 or 4 coached an athletic program.
Whoever said they associated coaches with english teaching jobs is living on mars. In my 9 years of teaching I've only ever known or met 1 coach who taught English and he taught primarily low level sections. teaching english and coaching does NOT mesh well considering the time requirements for both jobs.
I majored in History (BA) and Social Studies Edu (BEd) in college primarily out of an interest in history and social studies. I initially had notions of going to law school but decided against it mid way through. I did begin getting into coaching immediately after high school working with a local summer baseball team. It's funny because when I was student teaching in the fall of 2003 of the 7 of us in my cohort i was the only one with any athletic background playing or coaching and not to be sexist but i was one of only 2 males in the cohort.
I now teach US History and coach 3 years sports year round.
In my dept there are 12 of us at my school.
of those 12....
1 - female who teaches AP and IB Psych / no coaching
2 - male who teaches global studies 1 and us history / coaches football and track
3 - male who teaches AP US History / use to coach boys cross country
4 - male who teaches Govt / Econ / does not coach / but is our dept head
5 - male who teaches Psych / use to coach years ago but hasn't in about 15 years he said
6 - female who teaches AP Human Geo and Law Edu / no coaching
7 - male who teaches global studies 1, global studies 2 and AP Human Geo / coaches boys lacrosse
8 - male who teaches global studies 1 and us history / coaches football
9 - male who teaches global studies 1 / use to coach football but no more
10 - male who teaches american civil war class and drivers edu / head boys basketball coach
11 - female who teaches global studies 2 and sociology / no coaching
12 - ME - teaches US History / coaches swimming, wrestling and track
there are 3 females, none of them coach. Our athletic director just so happens to be female and she puts a premium on hiring female coaches at least for female sports but she has very little say in the overall hiring process when it comes to teaching slots.
while social studies at my school as far as a dept goes does still rule the roost so to speak when it comes to coaching hires less than half of our dept is involved with athletics.
with all that being said I from time to time check out job boards around the state and in other states and places like oklahoma or texas yes you will find an above average amount of teaching jobs being linked to coaching. often these are jobs at rural small schools that need to fill both voids and it is financially efficient to do so.
I know in small town Ohio where I'm originally from it is imperative that the admins hire someone to fill both positions because it can be difficult to hire someone just to coach especially anybody of any quality when the salary is for a head coaching job going to range from $2,000 to $10,000.
In my experience it is easier to get hired in at a school with no coaching stipulations if that school has a solid base of coaches to begin with and doesn't need to use teaching jobs to attract coaches or vice versa and if that school is in a large metro area where the pool of athletic job applicants will be much more varied and diverse in their qualifications and skills.
in my experience admins like to kill as many birds with as few stones as possible. so if they have a chance to hire a teacher and a coach with one interview then they will do it.
many times admins make these stipulations because those veteran teachers that are already in house are no longer interested in doing these other school related activities. I know my school has a very difficult time keeping anyone who wants to do student government as an adviser. In fact it got so bad that this year they didn't hire 1 person they simply a committee of 5 teachers if they would work together to run SGA.
Hiring coaching jobs at some schools and in some sports can be a pain as well. AD's don't always receive dozens of applications for every sport (except football, although most of those are delusional dads who play way too much Madden on the weekends and they have an amazing playbook to share). I know my school last year needed to hire a girls volleyball coach. Our girls vball program the last few years has been very good, not state good but regionally pretty good. we had ZERO applicants. my AD had to go back to the old coach and ask if there was anything she could do to get her to come back. My AD eventually talked our girls basketball coach into doing it but my point remains the same. Hiring for coaching jobs can sometimes become a more difficult task than hiring teachers. So building principals do put a premium on those teaching applicants who happen to be able to coach or have willingness to coach.
Those who are reaching for the sexist button are doing just that reaching. and reaching hard to be honest. Just like any other profession the more skill sets you bring to the table the more likely you are to a.) get a job and b.) hold on to that job.
If your only skill set is you teach and that's it then good luck and god bless you on your job hunt.
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