Are American posters on this BBS a minority

[john9001]

lazs

[Cthulhu]

lazs2, I couldn't have said it better myself.

And I'll add an additional observation of my own. While I was getting my engineering degree (WAAY back in the seventies) it was a commonly held belief on campus that the School of Education was the last chance for all those students who found themselves unable to cut it in more challenging curriculums.

Just fanning the flames.

[Brenjen]

I don't think it's the teachers that have destroyed the public school system. It's the liberal mindset, they used to grade you for the work YOU did, now they grade on a curve so the dumb kids can still pass, like welfare for the mind. (how does that make sense?)

 When they decide to grade you on your own merits & flunk the idiots regardless of their race, creed or religion & arrest them for truancy when they don't show up for school; that's when it will get better (it never will).

 I like the voucher idea, I agreed with that from the first moment I heard it being entertained. Public schools are beyond hope & the public school system, from the local administration (school board) all the way up to the federal govt. are equally to blame.

 There is a huge laundry list of problems with public schools, but the teachers didn't cause the problems. The teachers jumped on for the ride, but they didn't cause it.

[midnight Target]

Teaching is an honorable profession and grossly underpaid. It is definitely NOT something anyone could do. The best of teachers are artists.

[Shuckins]

Lasz,

Don't make the assumption that I'm defending the public school system.  I'm not.  I support the issuance of school vouchers and parental choice.  

I have backed that belief with personal action, to the point of pulling my youngest out of the very school in which I taught, knowing full well that it would p i s s off my superintendent.  The district had allowed the children of two local ladies, one of whom was the wife of a board member, to skip a grade in order to be in a class with more "capable" children.  I wanted my youngest to start school in the same class with my oldest son, because the children in his class were top knotch, while those in my youngest son's class were shaping up to be a bunch of hooligans.

When the superintendent and elementary principle refused my request, I pulled him out of school.  According to state law there wasn't a dam-med thing they could do about it.  The first year of his school career was spent at home being educated by the wife under my supervision, and all the materials were supplied by my district.  The principal even threatened to take the wife to court (I didn't find out about that until much later) but nothing came of it.

The education of my child is MY responsibility and not the school's.  Period.  Anybody who disagrees can kiss my fat hairy....well I won't go there.

What I'm defending is the thirty years I've devoted to this profession and the outstanding individuals it has been my privilege to associate with during that time.

Does the teaching profession have crappy members whose only positive contribution to the world has been their production of fertilizer?  Sure....but every profession has them.  Aren't there people in your line of work (What the hell do you DO anyway?) that you would prefer to see digging ditches with a ball and chain around their ankles?  I'll bet the answer is "yes."

I've supported the sacking of an otherwise outstanding teacher because he played mind-manipulation games with the students, mainly girls, and was called to the carpet about it on three separate occasions, in one case telling the 14 year old daughter of a friend of mine that her parents didn't really understand her but he did and wrote her love letters and a ring and promising to leave his wife for her....pardon me while I retch.  If he had played those types of games with a daughter of mine I'd be peeing on his grave right now.

I've never belonged to the AEA or NEA and generally have avoided teacher's unions like the plague.  They are purely self-serving political institutions that have done little if anything to improve the public image of the profession.

I'm not a saint....as my wife would be happy to point out.  Never claimed to be such.  You and I have probably wallowed in some of the same decadent mud puddles of life.  But I take my job seriously and I don't feel like I deserve the derision of some of the ill-informed posters on these boards.

You're a pretty intelligent guy.  You can't possibly believe that tripe about teachers being unable to perform in any "real" profession, or that all those with genuine talent go into other lines of work.

I'm sure many believe that the most talented bypass the teaching profession to earn real money.  There's no question about that.  Yet, it is also true that the teaching profession probably has ALL those who are TRULY concerned about the education and welfare of our children.  For the rest, the money just isn't enough.

Thereby hangs a quandary for the detractors of America's educational system.  They don't want to pay teachers more money because they feel that they do not deserve it and yet, at the same time, are wracking their brains trying to find a way to attract more of our top achievers into the profession.....but there isn't ANY way to do that without increasing the PAY.

Take another look at the net pay from the last school in which I taught;  $2,200 dollars a month....for a total of $26,400 a year.  

Care to guess what the take home pay for a beginning teacher is?  Would YOU guys work for THAT?

Many of you would not.  

So there you have it...a Catch 22 situation.  You cannot attract the best and brightest without a major influx of cash....and that's the LAST thing that some of you are willing to support.

Lasz, I regret that I touched a raw nerve in my previous post.  You have made some very pertinent points.  However, I will cast my gauntlet at the feet of anyone who disparages the top-quality people I have worked with in the teaching profession during my career.

Walk a mile in our moccasins, Kemosabe....

Regards, Shuckins

[storch]

Originally posted by midnight Target
Teaching is an honorable profession and grossly underpaid. It is definitely NOT something anyone could do. The best of teachers are artists.

I can agree with that

[Vulcan]

Originally posted by Shuckins
Not on your life Magee!  I needed that summer sabbatical to recapture my sanity!  And believe you me that rascal shore  runs fast!

Uhhhhhhh....shuckins go sit in the corner with HT.

[Vudak]

Lazs, I don't necessarily think you're thickheaded...  At least not beyond reason or any more so than I am...  You're actually one of the few guys on here I've noticed who can say, "Well, you've got a point there , but not here ."  So I can respect your opinions on things.

At the same time, I think a big part of our disagreement here is simply geographic...  I don't know what schools and teachers are like where you come from, or where you've been, but they might as well be on Mars from what I've heard, because your arguments are not making sense to me from where I've come from and where I've been.

Up here in CT, teaching is not  an easy profession to get into.  I'd know - I'm trying to become one, and I go to what is arguably the "teachers college" in CT.

Up here, I'm looking at a program where, even if I took more classes than necessary, I still wouldn't be able to graduate with a BS in less than FIVE years, where just about every other major offered at my college can be accomplished four, or even three in some cases.

I don't know the exact attrition rate in my program, but I do know it's at least more than 50%.

Then, if I do in fact make it through, and get a job up here, I'm required by law to obtain a Masters within a few years, too.

Of course, getting that job, at least in CT, is far, FAR from certain as the competition's so great.  I do what I can to try and set myself apart from the crowd (Dean's List, work on the newspaper, maybe study abroad for a year down the road), but even then, I don't know if I'll even be able to land a job, because the competition is so, well, competitive.  

I mean, when did you have your first teacher who had earned his/her doctorate?  I was in 3rd grade.  And this was a public school.

Not to say CT doesn't have its share of poor teachers and schools...  Of course it does.  But they do seem to be fewer and further between than in some other states I've spent time in.

I'm getting to be rambling here, but my point is, at least in CT, if you're bright and hard-working enough to land a job as a teacher, you're bright and hard-working enough to land a job elsewhere that pays twice as much.

But I don't know how it is where you're from.

[lukster]

Originally posted by midnight Target
Teaching is an honorable profession and grossly underpaid. It is definitely NOT something anyone could do. The best of teachers are artists.

Well here's an idea that might get the deserving ones more money. Privatize schools, the good teachers will be in demand and likely paid more. Vouchers will work to this end. I know that definitely does not fit in with the die hard socialist agenda but when enough of us demand it our leaders must listen.

[Skuzzy]

Teachers are not the problem in Texas.  The system is.  Once the schools prioritized getting state funding over teaching, everything went into the poop chute.

In Texas, schools get thier state funding based on how many students they pass.  has nothing to do with teaching,  I know for a fact there are teachers who have constant pressure on them to pass every student, no matter what it takes.

Yes, I also know teachers who have had thier grade books revised by committiee in order to pass students.

Vouchers will not help solve that problem.  It is a state wide issue here.  As a matter of fact, vouchers will make the problem worse.  Now you put the schools in competition with each other for students, so the schools do more to ensure all thier students get higher grades.

Why?  Because higher grades means better chances at college scholarships, better possibilities in gettgin into better (perceived) colleges and so on.

Vouchers will not solve the problems with the Texas education system.  It is a highly corrupt system, driven by greed.  There is no way in hell, a really good teacher would ever move to Texas to teach.

Most parents are clueless about the state of the school system, and they like it like that.  As long as they can slap that "My brat is an honor student at ....." bumper sticker on thier mini-van, they are content.  Nevermind the reality of the situation.

Teachers, in Texas, are only now becoming a problem and only because the school systems run off the good ones in favor of those who could care less about the education level of the student.

You see, the good teachers actually go public, from time to time, and reveal the ugliness of our schools.  But there are many times those stories never reach the public.  Why?  Because the news people are also parents and they simply do not want to believe it is true.  After all, it would tarnish thier bumper sticker.

[AWMac]

Skuzz was she was a Long Cool Woman in a Black Dress?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lP94PlEtsEQ



Mac

[Shuckins]

Skuzzy, I agree that public schools are under undue pressure to live up to "standards" that undercut their true purpose.  That is why I support vouchers that would allow parents, especially those of lower socio-economic status, to send their children to schools of their choice, including private schools if that is what they believe will most benefit their child.

Healthy competition is just one of the things that would mitigate some of the problems with education in this country.

There also needs to be a major house cleaning at the elementary level...if not of personnel then of ideas.  Some of the new-age educational fads need to be dumped forthwith.  The abandonment of the phonetics system in favor of the whole word approach has done incalculable harm, as has the abandonment of rote memorization, specifically of multiplication and division tables.

The most common educational problem among the juvenile delinquents that I deal with is a lack of knowledge of basic multiplication facts.  Quite a few have been taught how to solve multiplication problems by counting on their fingers (I kid you not.).  This works fine unless the kid miscounts, which they often do.  

I teach special education students.  As a result of the above I often have the absolutely insane situation of a student who is able to comprehend the basics of Algebra I, such as order of operations in solving linear equations, and yet has to solve the multiplication part of such equations by counting on his fingers.

If I had any hair left I would be pulling it out.

Regards, Shuckins

[Skuzzy]

Giving the parents the choice of where to send thier kids is not going to solve any problems, at least here in Texas.

I promise you, the day you give parents the right to chose where thier kids can go to school, is the day you will see the school systems put on a whole new outward face, berift of any substance, in order to lure the kids into the school by impressing the parents.

There are parents (and unfortunately, a very high majority) who would gladly send thier kid to the school where they will get the best grades.  This has no bearing on what the kids are actually learning.

Here is an example.  I had a neighbor who live across the street from me, and as often happens, you end up asking why move here?  Well, he was clear about that.  "Grapevine schools are some  of the highest rated schools in the D/FW area".

It did not take his kid long to figure out he did not need to do any homework, never bring home any books.  The school grades on the "curve".  If a student is still having problems, they can do "extra credit" work to shore up thier grades.  The "extra credit" work is superflous.  It does not get 'graded'.  Rather points are added to the students overall points for each "extra credit" assignment they turn in.

All he needed to do was "extra credit" work to pass with a 4.0 grade point average.  A 4.0, sounds impressive, until you know how he got it, and also understand that Grapevine actually pads the grade point average by 1 point for all the students.

Yet, you can hear it from any number of parents here about how wonderful the schools are.  Now tell me how vouchers are going to fix this?  The kid across the street got accepted to a very high end college.  He lasted 3 months before he was back home and 6 years later he is still living with his parents.  He has not been able to hold a job down at all.  He is completely illiterate.

This is not an uncommon scenario.  Vouchers only work when the parents and the school systems actually care about the quality of the education.  Unfortunately, most parents do not care.  Most want the schools to be the parent so the parents can be buddies with the kids.
Most schools do not care either, unless there is a dollar in it for them.  And if they want to win students over from parents with vouchers, then they can hire a good advertising agnecy to do a marketing plan for them,

It really is a pathetic mess.  If you want you children well educated, do not move to Texas.

[lazs2]

let's get something straight.. you are not getting 2,200 a month... you are getting closer to 3,000 a month for nine months work... really, less than nine months because you get more time off during that time than any other profession.

You can also work during the summer... yes...work.. that would mean...  you get paid from two jobs...

If you had a real job and were laid off during the summer you would get about 11-1200 a month on unemployment after a waiting period... you would lose the unemployment if you got a job.   You would also have no idea if you could work again come spring.  sooooo...

cry me a river.

the thing that gets me is that teachers think that they are the only people doing something noble.   that all other jobs don't count in the sainthood race...  It is fair game to make fun of a construction worker but not a teacher?   How did your house get built and....  who hires all the kids you failed to teach?

I never here teachers asking for better academic standards... they ask for more money..  

If they were so noble you would here em protesting the socialist practices in schools like passing everyone and such.. but nooo... they only have a voice when it comes to asking for more money or respect.

I respect the illegal doing the lawns more..  he works harder and competes more.   He doesn't ask that we instill sainthood upon him.

Teachers are overpaid and spoiled.   they are not the only good people in the work force..

I commend you shuckins for pulling your kids out of the public school system.  It would be nice if all of us could have vouchers and get some real competition going.... year round schools with real standards.. trade schools for those who fit there better.   Why send a kid with a low IQ but great mechanical skills to college?    That is what the democrats and the school system wants...

everyone goes to school no matter if it does em any good or not.   Some people just aren't made for it..  you guys need to learn that.  Having them in the system just drags the whole thing down and.. when there are no options save the public school system.... we get what we have now.

lazs

[Vudak]

Lazs, why are you going off about teachers thinking they're the only ones doing a noble job?

Who said that?

Overpaid and overspoiled?  Are you kidding me?

California's schools must be awful.  I'm sorry for you.

I agree with you on these thoughts though:

"I commend you shuckins for pulling your kids out of the public school system. It would be nice if all of us could have vouchers and get some real competition going.... year round schools with real standards.. trade schools for those who fit there better. Why send a kid with a low IQ but great mechanical skills to college? That is what the democrats and the school system wants...

everyone goes to school no matter if it does em any good or not. Some people just aren't made for it.. you guys need to learn that. Having them in the system just drags the whole thing down and.. when there are no options save the public school system.... we get what we have now."

---

But...  Before you go slamming teachers and school systems nationwide...  We have trade and tech schools up here where the kids will still get a regular high school diploma while learning their trade.  They don't have to go to college afterwards, but having that high school diploma sure will help if they find they'd like to.