For my most recent blog post I read other blogs about what is happening to teachers around the country. It seems like some of the educational blogs take a bit of a break during the summer, but I read many interesting posts about the issues facing teachers that were written earlier in the spring. These posts were written about what is happening to the teacher profession due to the recent attacks on teacher's unions in the last couple of months.
It seems that many people feel that education is the first place to cut when budget deficits come up. They feel that since states standardized test scores have not improved this is a sign that teacher do not deserve to be compensated as they were in the past. They feel that instead of spending more on education to make it better, they can make it better by paying teachers less. This is not to say that scores cannot come up without spending more money. I am sure that there are many things out there that can be done to make educational districts more effective and efficient. People will say that regardless of class size or technology in the classroom there is no replacement for a good teacher. If this is true, which I believe it is, then the best way to recruit the best and brightest is NOT to pay them less. If you are a recent high school graduate and you have studied hard and gotten into a really good school why would you work hard for four years to get a job where people think you are overpaid, lazy, and you have to put up with screaming parents all day? Instead they will go into engineering or business where they can make way more money and not have to deal with all of those negatives.
The parallel that I always use when talking with people about this is how people treat military funding. When the U.S. military has trouble achieving their goals, like they have in Iraq and Afghanistan, people argue that they need more funding and man power. Which I agree with and am glad that they get the support they deserve. But when people see that educational systems are not meeting their goal they blame the teachers and cut funding instead of giving teachers the additional funding and support they need to make a real difference in the American public school system.
Peter,
ReplyDeleteyour second pharagraph is really good. I like that you stated to get the best adn the brightes you will not get tehme by paying them less. Your parallel to the the militay is a great example of how people tend to see things in a different light. You are so right lets get teh teacher what they need to help all the students out. I really enjoyed reading what you had to say on this post. Two humbs up to you and your opinion.
There are many reasons to choose a career in education, but at the same time there are many deterrents. The salary issues surrounding teaching are one of the reasons why many people do turn away from the career. I like your viewpoint on the issue Peter. More funding is given to other areas like the military, but education just seems to continually get budget cuts. I don't fully understand all of the issues behind the huge numbers it takes to run a classroom, but somehow I think the real issue comes down to greed and not being responsible with the money that is allocated towards education. The bummer of it all is that I don't think this issue will ever be solved.
ReplyDeleteHi Peter,
ReplyDeleteYou make an excellent point with your comparison between teacher funding and military funding. Having been in both situations (my mom is a teacher and my husband was in the military), I can relate to both.
Unfortunately, after some of the things that were recently in the news (Atlanta public school teachers cheating so that kids got better scores on exams, or Wisconsin teachers striking and calling in "sick"), it does not make the "case" for teachers a good one. It's so sad that there are so many excellent teachers out there who do not get the pay or recognition they deserve, while there are other teachers who should be FIRED, but who are not because of tenure or other reasons.
As with a lot of other things, I think that if funding were better managed, teachers could get paid a lot more than they do. I don't think any of us is going into teaching to "get rich," though. Still, it would be nice to be compensated a little better.
I don't think I could follow the blog you are following because it would get me way too riled up! Thanks for your post, though!
I enjoyed reading your blog post, this sounds like a really interesting blog to follow. I agree that it is to often that the "great" teachers are lumped together with the "lazy" teachers. This unfortunately does give teaching a bad name that is hard to overcome. I liked your comparison to the military, I have never really looked at these professions together and compared them before.
ReplyDeleteYour blog was fun to read. I like how you compare education to the military, because people don't see it the same way we do. If you think about it, daycare providers are often paid at least $5 hour per child. If teachers were paid to just babysit their 30 students they should make $150/hour. Instead, we are supposed to teach the kids at the same time. How do people not see that teachers should get paid more? It just baffles me.
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