A friend of mine told me two stories lately that I MUST share with you...
Since I have to watch investigative reports and newspaper stories attacking
teachers for taking too many sick days.
For all of those working in your cubicle, I'm not sure how many fights you have to break up, how many times someone says they are going to kill you...but I'm guessing you might need a day off every now and then if these things happened to you:
1. My friend has a student teacher right now. There is a student who shows up for one of his classes and either tries to sleep or starts yelling and swearing within 10 minutes of class. After one of these times he is send out to the VP's office. After the very effective counseling session, the boy comes back down and peaks his head in the room. He leaves after making a gun out of his hand and "shooting it" at the teacher. I know, no big deal. (that was sarcasm)
Now the teacher wants the kid expelled from the school. The mother comes in and has a 30 minute swearing session where she says "You crackers be lying on my boy" "Your a white ass bitch" "Youse not be treatin my boy right."
The boy is not kicked out of school but taken out of the teachers class....for a week
Then he is back in the class because the mother insists.
The next day, the boy starts swearing again, and is taken out.
Now the mom comes to school swearing again, but this time at the head secretary. She wants papers so she can send her boy to MATC to finish high school. Never mind the fact the kid is 18 and has 2 credits.
After a lot more swearing someone who knows here reminds here that "she has paper on her"...meaning she has a warrent out for her arrest and she should leave now.
2. With about 20 minutes left in class, a fight breaks out in the hallway. This would seem impossible since it is during class and if no one is in the hallway no one can fight. Well, on this rare occurrence that somehow someone got into the hallway, there is now a fight.
Within a minute over one hundred kids are in the hallway and no one can get to the fight. Kids will not listen to security and teachers who are trying to get into the mess. They don't have to listen because they run the school. In the inner city, kids tell the teachers and administrators what happens because they have so many advocates sticking up for them, they never really get into trouble. If the principal starts to crack down, some idiot tells them they are being to hard on the kids, and how are the kids supposed to learn if they are always in trouble and suspended.
So, after the fight is broken up (where a teacher was hurt...didn't see that in the paper) the kids don't go back to class, they run up and down the halls chanting and screaming.
So there ya go...this is just one week of stories from one teacher from one school.
Make sure to call TMJ4 and the Milwaukee Urinal and let them know what you think about news organizations that attack teachers.
Monday, May 26, 2008
The life of the "overpaid, underworked" inner city teacher
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18 comments:
Great post. I don't think many have an idea what teachers go through on a daily basis.
So teachers get bitched at once in a while. Just what do you think customer service reps do for 40hr a week? And are you recommending teachers be paid ten dollars an hour like real security guards?
No offense, but most teachers do not know what a real job is like. On top of it, the bulk of them are ignorant even in their own domain, unable to master tasks such as basic spelling. At the primary and secondary levels, they're nothing more than overpaid babysitters.
GAME...IMAGINE THAT...I too missed this on news 4 or in the Milwaukee Urinal..still...for those who have some time and want to question why this wasn't "newsworthy"..there are phone numbers available to ask
about school related situations that would qualify as "news"...
Honestly, I don't know how anybody can teach teenagers these days!! Now, add inner city problems to this mess...!
Well, all you can do is to...stay safe.
wow Jason...I agree you CAN be a bad teacher and get away with it, but a good teacher has a tough day every day...sorry you don't have a clue in regards to this issue...but most conservatives show great ignorance in this topic...
way to throw in that insult...sorry, but that is something a liberal would do...I can't just rip the liberals...when a conservative is wrong, they need to be called out...
you sir, are flat out wrong.
“…what do you think customer service reps do for 40hr a week?
40 hours a week?! What a cake job! I wish I could get by with a part-time job.
jason, your post couldn't be anymore inaccurate and flat out wrong. people like you are the ones that expect teachers to shape tomorrow's leaders, but don't want to pay them or in any way support their selfless commitment.
while i would point to the actions of many conservatives, rather than liberals, as adding to the problems in schools today, i second the game's comments.
So we're "nothing more than overpaid babysitters," eh?
What's the going rate for a babysitter? $20 a night, maybe, plus fridge privileges? If "a night" is maybe four hours of kid-watching, that would mean $5 per hour per kid. I teach, over the course of the day, a little over 4.5 hours (not counting non-supervisory responsibilities such as lesson planning, meetings, parent contacts, paper grading, etc.), and I average about 30 kids for those 4.5 hours. I teach 180 days a year (not counting days of inservice and record-keeping). So, 4.5 x 30 x $5 = $675 per day; $675 x 180 days = $121,500. Plus whatever the equivalent may be for the fridge privileges.
Seems like I'm not even close to what a babysitter would make!
I still have a hard time understanding how sports players get millions of dollars, and teachers, who have the responsibility (along with the parents) of teaching our future generation, get paid next to nothing. It makes absolutely no sense to me.
Wow! Jason! What-up, dude? Was that just play-acting? I can't believe that's your real opinion on the matter. One of us is trippin', and I think it's you!
Chris,
It's easy. Entertainers always make the big dough, since only so many can do what they do, and millions of us like to watch them. It makes perfect sense.
I’m with you on this one Marshall! I think Jason was/is trying to “suck us in” for a greater point.
Then again I look at the John Dewey education lobby and can understand his frustration. So, I’m not quite sure if he’s trying to make a greater point or just blowing steam at already pointed out shortcomings.
I mean what I say.
Chris --
There are ed systems around the world getting better results than us with drastically less resources. There are ed systems in our past that got better results with drastically less resources. Money isn't the problem.
Usually, you have to obtain better results *before* you get the pay raise. Like good Democrats, folks in education think they are entitled to money because of who they are.
Blamin--
Unlike security guards and customer service reps, most teachers have June, July, and August off. BTW-- are you tenured?
Game--
I'll go a step further. We need to get rid of sex education, drug education, health education, physical education, and get back to basics. Teachers need to educate our kids; enough with promoting "change."
Oh, and I'm just wondering...
How many of you have people bring guns to your work looking to shoot people?
How many of you have police with riffles and hand guns walking around looking for cOh, and I'm just wondering...
How many of you have people bring guns to your work looking to shoot people?
How many of you have police with riffles and hand guns walking around looking for co-workers
It just seems unbelievable to me that there are people in this world that have no clue at all what happens in an inner city school building...
And you know what, I am very confident that I would rather have an inner city kid stay off drugs and not get pregnant that move from the 4th grade reading level to the 5th grade reading level.
To make the argument that we have to go back to the basics makes no sense, since teachers can only do so much with the basics. When no one at home cares and no one at home makes sure kids do their work or assists their kids in learning of how to read and write, the teacher is not going to make up for all that is going on around a kid.
They do the best they can, and they expose them to all of the life lessons that they do not get at home.
Maybe some of it will stick.
And I'm pretty sure the 25K in financial aid I got for one of my softball players is a hell of a lot more than any English teacher got for anyone...
Oh, and July and August are manditory lay-offs...not vacation days
I get 2 paid vacation days a year, how many do you get?
Oh, and how much do you make, and what do you do for that pay.
To get my pay up to 60K a year I have to coach three sports, teaching swimming lessons, do security and other jobs for football games, score and time, officiate basketball, umpire baseball, run special olympics, work security at the Wisconsin State Fair and on and on and on...
For the last 12 weeks I have been at school from 730am to 730pm
Where is my extra pay, where is my overtime....lmfao
ha ha ha
Overtime....wow...that would be even more funny if the way some conservatives see teachers and the educational system wasn't so sad.
How much do teachers "deserve" to make, game? 100K? Shouldn't their pay be tied to their performance?
Forgive me, but I'm absolutely disgusted. I have a Bachelor's in Physics and would love to teach science in an inner-city school. I'm willing to do it at a lower price too. Since most science teachers in America do not even have science degrees, it is not improbable I can deliver superior results.
That's not going to happen, because there are organizations called teacher's unions who care less about the children and more about protecting their privileges. They've erected huge barriers to entry, which involve a ridiculous certification process and the thousands of dollars to obtain an education degree.
Supposedly this is to protect teacher quality. Bullshit. Most teachers can't even spell words like "hypocrisy" correctly. ;)
BTW, here is how the future looks like. I have no problem paying people what they're worth. That however should be determined by the demand and supply, not how much teachers care, how important they see their work, or their commitment to social justice^tm.
In short, social justice is delivering a superior product at a lower cost.
There must be a certification process, the fact that many teachers in MPS get on the fast and easy track is one of the problems we are having...
Sorry to break this too you, but just because you know a lot about a subject does not mean you know how to teach it. Usually those "teachers" are in college where the kids have the skills to pick up the info anyway.
And if you paid on performance, how would that work?
Does that mean the teacher in the burbs would get like 140K while I get 30K even though I am probably working much harder and dealing with a lot more crap?
If that is the case you would have NO good teachers in the inner city.
the companies runnning schools already happens here, but in most cases it is not official.
The school hires a company to create and monitor their curriculum. I know a school where there were always three people there making sure the teachers were on the exact correct lesson, had the right posters up, everything had to be exactly the way it was in the binder...
And yes, unions do a lot more to protect bad teachers than reward good ones, that is how all unions work...
And finally, unless you have been in an inner city public school for an extended period I would have doubts that you would like doing it...
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