Everyone has to be rich now??

[FilterFunk]

turn their droolers, screamers and fighters into a combination of Mother Teresa and Albert Einstein.

It's interesting that you put it this way regarding the kind of results that people expect teachers to get from their students, especially under the circumstances.

I tend to say that people expect teachers to be a combination of Jaime Escalante and Robin Williams - an uber-dedicated super-teacher whose also an extraordinary entertainer. If not, then it's somehow the teachers' fault for not making the class interesting enough. Of course, very few people want to address the elephant in the room - misbehaving, disrespectful students spawned and reared by willfully ignorant parents who aren't concerned about their children's behavior unless they've committed a felony.

It wouldn't surprise me at all if low morale, low recruitment rates, and high turnover among teachers has as much to do with dealing with parents and students as it does with dealing with low pay, overwork, and bureaucracy.

 

[FilterFunk]

turn their droolers, screamers and fighters into a combination of Mother Teresa and Albert Einstein.

It's interesting that you put it this way regarding the kind of unrealistic results that people expect teachers to get from their students, especially under the circumstances.

I tend to say that people expect teachers to be a combination of Jaime Escalante and Robin Williams - an uber-dedicated super-teacher whose also an extraordinary entertainer. If not, then it's somehow the teachers' fault for not making the class interesting enough. Of course, very few people want to address the elephant in the room - misbehaving, disrespectful students spawned and reared by willfully ignorant parents who aren't concerned about their children's behavior unless they've committed a felony.

It wouldn't surprise me at all if low morale, low recruitment rates, and high turnover among teachers has as much to do with having to deal with parents and students as it does with having to deal with low pay, overwork, and bureaucracy.

 

[nutdog]

Where's that chart from and what exactly is it tracking? I couldn't find it in the SHEF report, if it's there, what page?

At the top menu under state profiles, GA. SHEF State Profile for Georgia

Edit: and it looks like it’s tracking a #!*?load of money

 

[MJ5150]

It's interesting that you put it this way regarding the kind of unrealistic results that people expect teachers to get from their students, especially under the circumstances.

I tend to say that people expect teachers to be a combination of Jaime Escalante and Robin Williams - an uber-dedicated super-teacher whose also an extraordinary entertainer. If not, then it's somehow the teachers' fault for not making the class interesting enough. Of course, very few people want to address the elephant in the room - misbehaving, disrespectful students spawned and reared by willfully ignorant parents who aren't concerned about their children's behavior unless they've committed a felony.

It wouldn't surprise me at all if low morale, low recruitment rates, and high turnover among teachers has as much to do with having to deal with parents and students as it does with having to deal with low pay, overwork, and bureaucracy.

I can still hear my grandfather and then my father telling me.....'you get out of it what you put into it'. I said it to my children too.

-Mike

 

[definenredefine]

And Elon Musk and a whole host of other people/entities.

Indeed.

I am jealous of Georgia and HOPE. My state is backwards in many ways. We are one of 2 states that does not have a state lottery. 2! And the only one east of the Mississippi. It is ridiculous. State politicians are on the take to keep it from ever happening. A lottery is a tax on the willing and that is the best kind of tax there can ever be. Using these dollars to help take care of college costs is a benefit to everyone. If there really is always someone else to blame, I am blaming the government of my state for being backwards and holding us back.

Well..it's not always sunshine and roses. John Oliver did a whole episode about how well lotto funding is working for education and um...let's just say not terribly well.

Teachers need a whole lot more than just experience to be able to teach, demonstrate to, and inform younger people. Experience does not give one the ability to convey knowledge effectively or all of the other things that go into keeping a classroom focused.

And how! One of my professors in pharmacy school was an experienced hospital pharmacist who was very smart and experienced in that part of the field and still a pretty not great teacher.

 

[nutdog]

Indeed.

Well..it's not always sunshine and roses. John Oliver did a whole episode about how well lotto funding is working for education and um...let's just say not terribly well.

And how! One of my professors in pharmacy school was an experienced hospital pharmacist who was very smart and experienced in that part of the field and still a pretty not great teacher.

I think I’m with you on the lottery but it may be like the big sports programs that benefit Ed even though the academics don’t like it (or know it). Maybe people need a little fun to get them fork out for what they need.

On teacher qualifications, I went to a school for socially inept nerds, taught by socially inept nerds and run by socially inept nerds. Do you think all of my professors were boatloads of educational joy and wisdom? I’m reasonably certain most of them were not really there to teach but do research. During my flying career, I had many, many instructors. Some were good and some were bad but they were all Certified Flight Instructors.

In any event at this point, I have no intention of teaching. I did some substituting and it cured me of that notion so you guys can rest easy. I won’t be indoctrinating the kids with silly notions of debt-free living and earning your way.

 

[friskinator]

It's interesting that you put it this way regarding the kind of results that people expect teachers to get from their students, especially under the circumstances.

I tend to say that people expect teachers to be a combination of Jaime Escalante and Robin Williams - an uber-dedicated super-teacher whose also an extraordinary entertainer. If not, then it's somehow the teachers' fault for not making the class interesting enough. Of course, very few people want to address the elephant in the room - misbehaving, disrespectful students spawned and reared by willfully ignorant parents who aren't concerned about their children's behavior unless they've committed a felony.

It wouldn't surprise me at all if low morale, low recruitment rates, and high turnover among teachers has as much to do with dealing with parents and students as it does with dealing with low pay, overwork, and bureaucracy.

I wouldn't be a public school teacher for any amount of money, for all the reasons listed above.

 

[JazznFunk]

It's interesting that you put it this way regarding the kind of unrealistic results that people expect teachers to get from their students, especially under the circumstances.

I tend to say that people expect teachers to be a combination of Jaime Escalante and Robin Williams - an uber-dedicated super-teacher whose also an extraordinary entertainer. If not, then it's somehow the teachers' fault for not making the class interesting enough. Of course, very few people want to address the elephant in the room - misbehaving, disrespectful students spawned and reared by willfully ignorant parents who aren't concerned about their children's behavior unless they've committed a felony.

It wouldn't surprise me at all if low morale, low recruitment rates, and high turnover among teachers has as much to do with having to deal with parents and students as it does with having to deal with low pay, overwork, and bureaucracy.

A lot of this is spot on. Offering this, again, as the spouse of an 18 year veteran teacher (6th and 7th grades). The kids themselves can definitely be a challenge, and some classes are better than others, but the main thing my wife deals with is a lack of solid options on the part of administration to properly discipline and remove the kids who are causing the most problems so the kids who want to learn and are good kids - which is honestly the majority - can do that. She loves the kids, and loves teaching when she actually gets to teach. Parents who are blissfully unaware of how bad their kids are in school, away from them, is a big issue. That starts at home.... where accountability and character begin. I was raised to be the same person in public, away from home, as I was at home. Of course, I screwed that up on several occasions, but not to any irreversible degree. But what I received was proper discipline and guidance - and the resources and desire just aren't there on numerous levels anymore to instill that in kids these days.

Back to the main issue - the thing that almost made my wife quit on several occasions, outside of the pay, was simply not being supported by admin. That would make all of the parent and student issues easier to swallow.

 

[turf3]

It's interesting that you put it this way regarding the kind of results that people expect teachers to get from their students, especially under the circumstances.

I tend to say that people expect teachers to be a combination of Jaime Escalante and Robin Williams - an uber-dedicated super-teacher whose also an extraordinary entertainer. If not, then it's somehow the teachers' fault for not making the class interesting enough. Of course, very few people want to address the elephant in the room - misbehaving, disrespectful students spawned and reared by willfully ignorant parents who aren't concerned about their children's behavior unless they've committed a felony.

It wouldn't surprise me at all if low morale, low recruitment rates, and high turnover among teachers has as much to do with dealing with parents and students as it does with dealing with low pay, overwork, and bureaucracy.

Back in my ISO9000 days, the point was always made that it's "an audit of the system, not the people". If your system (in this case the public educational system) can't work with employees who fall on the normal distribution of both commitment and ability, it's a bad system. Defining a system that requires all its employees to be +2 standard deviations in both commitment and talent, is to define a system guaranteed to fail.

Instead of making it so only the aforementioned +2 SD individuals will be able to overcome the systematic barriers to success and teach students the curriculum, how about removing the systematic barriers so the ordinary chap can teach school?

 

[richntiff]

It's interesting that you put it this way regarding the kind of unrealistic results that people expect teachers to get from their students, especially under the circumstances.

I tend to say that people expect teachers to be a combination of Jaime Escalante and Robin Williams - an uber-dedicated super-teacher whose also an extraordinary entertainer. If not, then it's somehow the teachers' fault for not making the class interesting enough. Of course, very few people want to address the elephant in the room - misbehaving, disrespectful students spawned and reared by willfully ignorant parents who aren't concerned about their children's behavior unless they've committed a felony.

It wouldn't surprise me at all if low morale, low recruitment rates, and high turnover among teachers has as much to do with having to deal with parents and students as it does with having to deal with low pay, overwork, and bureaucracy.

My wife is a veteran 1st grade teacher. I can tell you that you are spot on with that analysis. I couldn't have said it better myself. Parents/students, low pay, bureaucracy, and out of touch or radicalized school boards and administration.

 

[MuseChaser]

My wife is a veteran 1st grade teacher. I can tell you that you are spot on with that analysis. I couldn't have said it better myself. Parents/students, low pay, bureaucracy, and out of touch or radicalized school boards and administration.

As a retired public school teacher in NYS after 31 years and adjunct professor at various public and private universities, I agree, although the order of the list in terms of most-to-least frustrating may differ slightly...

1. Administration, including state and federal level as well as district and building level.

2. Bureaucracy, including the teachers' union as well as the entities listed above.

3. Budgets/Waste. This could be tied to the above, but as an orchestral music teacher this drove me nuts. Untold money available for, and in my opinion wasted on, new and useless administration assistant-on-special-assignment types positions, untold thousands on new tech that will be obsolete in a year or two, and if any money left over miraculously filters down to the music department, it ends up going to the marching band so everyone can see shiny new stuff at football games and competitions. Hmmmmm.... thought this was supposed to be an "education" system. My kids played on celli bases that, at times, were literally held together with duct tape when I didn't have time to (poorly) do the needed repairs myself. In the fifteen years I spent in my last district, I think I was allowed to purchase two new bases and two celli.

4. Parents failing to raise their kids or value education. I can't blame the students as much, as mostly they're all products of their upbringings and environments, but yes, it's frustrating when you can't reach the "hard cases" and get them to turn their lives around despite opportunity staring them in the face over and over.

5. Low pay. This is intentionally last on my list, and perhaps my view is skewed by the state in which I lived and taught. While my kids, based upon my salary as a first year teacher, would have been eligible for my first district's need-based "free lunch" program (which always struck me as ironic ... you're paying your teachers so little that they're below the level you think they can provide for their own kids?!?), we didn't use that option. Still, after a couple years in the profession, some moves to larger districts, taking on some extracurricular paid duties, etc., the "long game" of the profession has worked out well. At 31 years, with the required Master's degree and no further applicable post-graduate work, I never hit six figures (although a few of my colleagues managed to do so), but the NYS teachers' retirement system is strong and, between the pension and private retirement accounts we dutifully cultivated over the years, it's worked out well. Other than the first couple years, I never felt grossly underpaid, but I was always playing "the long game" after realizing it would work well for my family. It ain't a job for anyone who wants a lot expensive toys NOW or wants to live a rich-and-famous lifestyle, that's for sure, but it's not indentured servitude, either....at least as I've experienced it.

 

[Parzival]

I think I’m with you on the lottery but it may be like the big sports programs that benefit Ed even though the academics don’t like it (or know it). Maybe people need a little fun to get them fork out for what they need.

I agree, though I don't really trust Jon Oliver as the other poster mentioned. One of the big arguments in our state against lottery is, well, you know the state will mismanage it or steal it or who knows what. Ok. If any of the money goes to education, is it still not more than what we have now? Sure is. Is it a mandatory tax? Nope. It is a tax on the willing. You don't like the system, don't buy lottery tickets. It's really easy. We let our citizens go across borders and put millions and millions of dollars annually into four other states' education systems.

It is completely insane. But here is what is really gonna make you go WTH? In the state we have huge gambling halls and we have dog racing. Come the eff on. Makes you want to bang your head on the wall.

 

[hrodbert696]

At the top menu under state profiles, GA. SHEF State Profile for Georgia

Edit: and it looks like it’s tracking a #!*?load of money

Thanks for pointing me to it. I'm not a numbers or stats guy, so I've got some uncertainty exactly what each chart and stat really means in the big picture. When I click around, I'm seeing a number of exceptions and definitions, which I'm not sure of the meaning of across the board, but it does seem like the stats are intended to convey particular information for people in the field of academic administration. For example, "total education revenue" excludes "tuition revenue used for capital and debt service." "Education revenues" seems to entail a more limited body of spending than the total budget of a university. And, clearly, it's a profile for the state as a whole, including two-year colleges, where there seems to be more of the burden carried by state and local taxes than the four-year schools (kinda ironic that you hear a lot of "go to community college, it's cheaper," often from the same people who want more of the education cost carried by students. There's a reason it's cheaper!).

Whatever the exact meaning of the numbers, I wouldn't use them to falsify GA Tech's own statement of its finances. I would definitely say that Georgia is (rightly) more supportive of its students than NH is. Its student share of education revenues (whatever exactly is included or excluded in that) is 28% (though sadly up from 18% in 1980), where NH's is 68%, up from 54%.

 

[richntiff]

As a retired public school teacher in NYS after 31 years and adjunct professor at various public and private universities, I agree, although the order of the list in terms of most-to-least frustrating may differ slightly...

1. Administration, including state and federal level as well as district and building level.

2. Bureaucracy, including the teachers' union as well as the entities listed above.

3. Budgets/Waste. This could be tied to the above, but as an orchestral music teacher this drove me nuts. Untold money available for, and in my opinion wasted on, new and useless administration assistant-on-special-assignment types positions, untold thousands on new tech that will be obsolete in a year or two, and if any money left over miraculously filters down to the music department, it ends up going to the marching band so everyone can see shiny new stuff at football games and competitions. Hmmmmm.... thought this was supposed to be an "education" system. My kids played on celli bases that, at times, were literally held together with duct tape when I didn't have time to (poorly) do the needed repairs myself. In the fifteen years I spent in my last district, I think I was allowed to purchase two new bases and two celli.

4. Parents failing to raise their kids or value education. I can't blame the students as much, as mostly they're all products of their upbringings and environments, but yes, it's frustrating when you can't reach the "hard cases" and get them to turn their lives around despite opportunity staring them in the face over and over.

5. Low pay. This is intentionally last on my list, and perhaps my view is skewed by the state in which I lived and taught. While my kids, based upon my salary as a first year teacher, would have been eligible for my first district's need-based "free lunch" program (which always struck me as ironic ... you're paying your teachers so little that they're below the level you think they can provide for their own kids?!?), we didn't use that option. Still, after a couple years in the profession, some moves to larger districts, taking on some extracurricular paid duties, etc., the "long game" of the profession has worked out well. At 31 years, with the required Master's degree and no further applicable post-graduate work, I never hit six figures (although a few of my colleagues managed to do so), but the NYS teachers' retirement system is strong and, between the pension and private retirement accounts we dutifully cultivated over the years, it's worked out well. Other than the first couple years, I never felt grossly underpaid, but I was always playing "the long game" after realizing it would work well for my family. It ain't a job for anyone who wants a lot expensive toys NOW or wants to live a rich-and-famous lifestyle, that's for sure, but it's not indentured servitude, either....at least as I've experienced it.

I didn't take the time to rank - but you did, and I agree 100% with all of it. With regard to pay though - six figures is well out of reach for my wife, and she's been teaching full time for a little over 20 years now. We are in the midwest, so the metrics are different than NYS, but, yeah.... One thing that always strikes me is the similarity across the entire country about the challenges/frustrations that teachers face. I'll scream from the rooftops about the fact that teachers are heroes and deserve so much more than they get. I'm my wife's biggest fan.

 

[Major Seven]

Non-teachers have NO IDEA of the vast sea of paperwork (actually, on computer now) the ordinary teacher has to deal with. You think "grading papers in teh evening" - HA! It's all CYA documentation, is what it is.

And then there are the ever increasing number of staff development days, wherein 24 year old masters degree holders tell 60 year old teachers who've been in the classroom for 35 years how they're doing it all wrong and how this "SIMPLE!" set of new guidelines and "JUST A LITTLE BIT!" of additional documentation will turn their droolers, screamers and fighters into a combination of Mother Teresa and Albert Einstein. Or they've got to introduce this year's ALL!NEW!AAND!IMPROVED! curriculum (bought from the superintendent's brother-in-law's company...) with all its unnecessary and unwanted materials, that the teachers will have to find a place to stash along with the year before's stuff, and the year before that's stuff, because none of it's worth a damn and you've got to make the pretense of using it while the people from downtown are in the building....

Has the "common core " math fallen to this yet?

 

[Major Seven]

Teachers need a whole lot more than just experience to be able to teach, demonstrate to, and inform younger people. Experience does not give one the ability to convey knowledge effectively or all of the other things that go into keeping a classroom focused.

My wife recruits teachers, teacher's assistants, etc.. and too often during their screening when they are asked about qualified experience/education, the candidate responds with, "Well, I have two kids!"... They seldom make it further than that screening.

Reminds me of the parent with one 5 yr old who is now an expert on children, moreso than you.

 

[GretschWretch]

I think I’m with you on the lottery but it may be like the big sports programs that benefit Ed even though the academics don’t like it (or know it). Maybe people need a little fun to get them fork out for what they need.

On teacher qualifications, I went to a school for socially inept nerds, taught by socially inept nerds and run by socially inept nerds. Do you think all of my professors were boatloads of educational joy and wisdom? I’m reasonably certain most of them were not really there to teach but do research. During my flying career, I had many, many instructors. Some were good and some were bad but they were all Certified Flight Instructors.

In any event at this point, I have no intention of teaching. I did some substituting and it cured me of that notion so you guys can rest easy. I won’t be indoctrinating the kids with silly notions of debt-free living and earning your way.

My, some sustained two-day chippiness here. To be a good teacher requires more than command of the material. Good communication skills are essential. One of the search committees to find my successor had one candidate whose communication skills were so poor that the people viewing the presentation immediately knew there was no way that person could communicate clearly with faculty or students, never mind the committee. A second committee had to be formed.

I agree with you about the "not there to teach but to do research," and that trend has worsened with the years. For higher education I believe there should be two tenure tracks, each with their own promotion standards: one for those who want to excel in teaching and one for those who want to excel in research. It is very rare to find college or university faculty who are good at both teaching and research. No man can serve two masters.

 

[Stewie26]

Its been decades since my wife or I have attended college so my thoughts on this may be dated. That said, we started by both attending a 2 year community college which was free. The only direct cost was we had to purchase the book(s) required by the teacher for each class. Many times we were able to purchased used books. Does this education opportunity still exist today?

 

[GretschWretch]

I agree, though I don't really trust Jon Oliver as the other poster mentioned. One of the big arguments in our state against lottery is, well, you know the state will mismanage it or steal it or who knows what. Ok. If any of the money goes to education, is it still not more than what we have now? Sure is. Is it a mandatory tax? Nope. It is a tax on the willing. You don't like the system, don't buy lottery tickets. It's really easy. We let our citizens go across borders and put millions and millions of dollars annually into four other states' education systems.

It is completely insane. But here is what is really gonna make you go WTH? In the state we have huge gambling halls and we have dog racing. Come the eff on. Makes you want to bang your head on the wall.

And my home's in Alabama,
Where common sense cannot be found.

 

[turf3]

As to teachers (public schools) I firmly believe the unions have had the thing by the wrong handle for decades now. All the unions can seem to do is demand more pay and resist qualifications testing. In my opinion they ought to downplay the pay, drop their opposition to qualifications requirements for teachers, and instead focus on WORKING CONDITIONS. Paperwork, classroom discipline, constantly changing curricula for subjects whose fundamentals haven't changed in 100 (or 1000) years.

I'm sorry, you don't need a new reading method every two years. People have been learning to read alphabetic languages for thousands of years now by the same method - learn the sound(s) that each letter represents, then practice. Same with elementary school arithmetic. Get a bunch of popsicle sticks and you've got most of your tools right there - no need for each year's new set of "manipulables".

And I think it would be a reasonable trade to have teachers assessed for competence in subject matter, in return for reduction in paperwork. Do away with the idea that every student should receive individual tailored instruction every day and have their performance graded every day or two - stop the filling out of grade books - in return for submitting to assessment that we're competent in our subjects, leave the assignment of grades to the discretion of the teacher. If you, Ms. Administrator, think that teachers are REALLY doing all the stuff you're imposing on them, you're high. They're doing the best they can and then writing in a bunch of stuff in the grade book. They know which are the A and which the C kids and they're just making the numbers in the grade books reflect that - so cut to the chase and quit pretending.

The other trades for assessment of competence would be (1) Enforce classroom discipline. When a teacher sends a kid to the office, don't turn them right around and send them back and mark the teacher down. (2) Allow tracking again. It makes less than no sense to have a fifth grade classroom with mentally deficient kids, kids who read on first grade level, second, third, fourth, and fifth, all mixed in there together. You need to let each grade level's teachers separate the kids out so the ones that are way behind grade level get instruction suited to them without making the kids who're on level (or above) twiddle their thumbs and get into trouble while waiting for the others to get it. 3) Real class sizes. Yeah, they'll say "oh, we have a rule, maximum 25 kids per class", but what they do is they average in the Sped classes with 3 kids, and the regular classes have 45 in a room. Spend some of the money y'all are spending on laptops and curriculum materials on reducing actual class sizes.

I'll also point out that total money spent, at least in big city school districts, is not the problem. They don't need more money spent. If the average member of the public saw the oceans of money that run through big city schools, they'd be astonished. Yeah, teachers may have to bring their own toner and toilet paper, but it's not because the money's not there; it's because it's going to waste, fraud, and the enormous administration establishments downtown. Seriously, my very highly ranked private school, populated by the children of some of the richest people in the state, with facilities that are truly stunning in their fanciness - spends less per student than the local big city school district.

There are good reasons why something like half of all new teachers quit within five years. I guarantee very few of them are quitting because of the money.