What blows my mind is I discovered in the "Back to School Night" that the classes no longer utilize textbooks in high school. Math, science, history...they are gone. Only English for the book they are reading. I don't understand the logic in that.
MCPS teachers are experiencing the same issues with the common core curriculum. How can good instruction be delivered under these circumstances? Every day, up at 5 or 6am, plan, teach and plan again until 8 or 9pm, and to relax, eat dinner while you grade papers until 11pm. Wake up and start all over again! Will new teachers remain in the profession? I think not. Fifty percent of teachers leave the profession within the first 5 years of their employment. Get ready for that number to increase; now, it will be fifty percent in the first year or two of employment. New teachers will skip to Virginia, where salaries are equivalent and the pension is better. This is going to be a Weast nightmare! MCPS full of a bunch of aging teachers who will say "NO" to the 2.0. Who will they put on PAR? MCPS=a mess.
What a coincidence. I face the same issues in my job: long hours, new technology, new programs to implement. My spouse (different industry) is facing the same. I'm not a teacher...but I'm a professional and I don't get my summers off. Teachers, please take heart. You are being asked to improve the way you teach our children. No new programs are perfect in the beginning. But we need to embrace change in order to strive for perfection. And true professionals do so with grace.
Anon 8:06 - will a significant percentage of your annual performance review come down to test scores for which YOU will be held responsible, with those tests being based primarily on what is on those inaccessible databases? Are you given a month, give or take, before being expected to be able to fluently use the contents of those programs and databases, while also not being sufficient training or time to do so?
And can we stop with the "You get your summers off" rhetoric? Most of the teachers I know are taking additional coursework to retain their certification (at their own expense, and graduate credits don't come cheap!), and/or working second jobs, and/or teaching summer school. Most of them are NOT vacationing at Martha's Vineyard or jetting off to Hawai'i for 8 weeks of sun and surf. They're also not getting paid over the summers; they get paid for time worked during the year and that's it, so it's not even a paid holiday.
Walk a mile in a classroom before you throw around the platitudes, eh?
will a significant percentage of your annual performance review come down to test scores for which YOU will be held responsible, - YES, in another way
with those tests being based primarily on what is on those inaccessible databases? YES, in another way
Are you given a month, give or take, before being expected to be able to fluently use the contents of those programs and databases, while also not being sufficient training or time to do so? LESS THAN A MONTH - 24 HOURS
Hmmm..... so it seems we each have our own problems with different professions, then. Have the teachers in this article complained that their problems are greater than anyone else's? Have they minimized concerns of any other professions? No, they haven't. They are already held responsible for the education and well-being, at least during the school day, of our kids, and they are frustrated that they are expected to teach a curriculum which they have not yet received access to, and they are being held accountable for it. In any other career, that would also be a complaint-worthy situation, and I don't think any teachers in this article are comparing their jobs' shortcomings to yours; at least that isn't how I read it.
I've been a teacher, public school and private school, preschool through high school. I've done sales. I've done retail. I've done restaurant work. Many teachers have experience in other fields if they work second jobs (which many have to - not around here, but in some states teachers can't even get mortgages because their salaries are so low!), or if they work over the summer to keep the bills paid. Teachers do not "get summers off," believe me, not unless they're already independently wealthy and have all the coursework they'll ever need.
Since our tax dollars are being spent to develop Common Core, to develop curricula around it (or to purchase it pre-made), to test students on it, to grade teachers and schools on those tests (which, incidentally, even the makers of those tests decry), if teachers aren't being given access to the materials on which their effectiveness and ultimately their careers depend, not to mention our kids' education, then ALL of us, regardless of profession, should be upset about that IMO.
We just ask teachers to understand theirs is not the only profession which faces multiple challenges and is so critical to our nation's future. We, who are fortunate, choose our careers and dedicate untold amounts of time to them to be successful. When teachers complain (or whine) about the amount of time they must spend on grading papers after the bell rings, or how they are evaluated, or how little they supposedly earn, others just shake their heads and the image of a teacher professional goes down another notch. Many of us would appreciate the opportunity of condensing our annual salary into 10 months and having 2 months to work on various career-related certifications. That additional knowledge improves not just our skills but also our earning potential.
So when you condescendingly suggest others "walk a mile", consider doing so yourself. Perhaps that is also an effort that will help in relating to the students you teach. We all need to acknowledge that each has their own burden to bear.
In so saying, then perhaps *you* might be more considerate of the hurdles teachers face. If "[w]e all need to acknowledge that each has their own burden to bear," then why should teachers have to "suck it up" and NOT raise issues like this when they occur?
Nonsense happens in every profession, and in pretty much every profession there are forums on which people offload, whether online, in the workplace, or in the family. It sounds very cavalier to brush off teachers' concerns when we all have our own burdens to bear, as you put it. The teachers in the article linked have not said that it's only their job that has these issues; it was the commenters above that made it sound as if the teachers were magnifying their concerns to the exclusion of others' professions, but nowhere in the article did I see that - only in the comments section, from non-teachers who are making it about them.
What blows my mind is I discovered in the "Back to School Night" that the classes no longer utilize textbooks in high school. Math, science, history...they are gone. Only English for the book they are reading. I don't understand the logic in that.
ReplyDeleteMCPS teachers are experiencing the same issues with the common core curriculum. How can good instruction be delivered under these circumstances? Every day, up at 5 or 6am, plan, teach and plan again until 8 or 9pm, and to relax, eat dinner while you grade papers until 11pm. Wake up and start all over again! Will new teachers remain in the profession? I think not. Fifty percent of teachers leave the profession within the first 5 years of their employment. Get ready for that number to increase; now, it will be fifty percent in the first year or two of employment. New teachers will skip to Virginia, where salaries are equivalent and the pension is better. This is going to be a Weast nightmare! MCPS full of a bunch of aging teachers who will say "NO" to the 2.0. Who will they put on PAR? MCPS=a mess.
ReplyDeleteWhat a coincidence. I face the same issues in my job: long hours, new technology, new programs to implement. My spouse (different industry) is facing the same. I'm not a teacher...but I'm a professional and I don't get my summers off. Teachers, please take heart. You are being asked to improve the way you teach our children. No new programs are perfect in the beginning. But we need to embrace change in order to strive for perfection. And true professionals do so with grace.
ReplyDeleteAnon 8:06 - will a significant percentage of your annual performance review come down to test scores for which YOU will be held responsible, with those tests being based primarily on what is on those inaccessible databases? Are you given a month, give or take, before being expected to be able to fluently use the contents of those programs and databases, while also not being sufficient training or time to do so?
DeleteAnd can we stop with the "You get your summers off" rhetoric? Most of the teachers I know are taking additional coursework to retain their certification (at their own expense, and graduate credits don't come cheap!), and/or working second jobs, and/or teaching summer school. Most of them are NOT vacationing at Martha's Vineyard or jetting off to Hawai'i for 8 weeks of sun and surf. They're also not getting paid over the summers; they get paid for time worked during the year and that's it, so it's not even a paid holiday.
Walk a mile in a classroom before you throw around the platitudes, eh?
will a significant percentage of your annual performance review come down to test scores for which YOU will be held responsible, - YES, in another way
Deletewith those tests being based primarily on what is on those inaccessible databases? YES, in another way
Are you given a month, give or take, before being expected to be able to fluently use the contents of those programs and databases, while also not being sufficient training or time to do so? LESS THAN A MONTH - 24 HOURS
It's called sales. Give it a try.
Hmmm..... so it seems we each have our own problems with different professions, then. Have the teachers in this article complained that their problems are greater than anyone else's? Have they minimized concerns of any other professions? No, they haven't. They are already held responsible for the education and well-being, at least during the school day, of our kids, and they are frustrated that they are expected to teach a curriculum which they have not yet received access to, and they are being held accountable for it. In any other career, that would also be a complaint-worthy situation, and I don't think any teachers in this article are comparing their jobs' shortcomings to yours; at least that isn't how I read it.
DeleteI've been a teacher, public school and private school, preschool through high school. I've done sales. I've done retail. I've done restaurant work. Many teachers have experience in other fields if they work second jobs (which many have to - not around here, but in some states teachers can't even get mortgages because their salaries are so low!), or if they work over the summer to keep the bills paid. Teachers do not "get summers off," believe me, not unless they're already independently wealthy and have all the coursework they'll ever need.
Since our tax dollars are being spent to develop Common Core, to develop curricula around it (or to purchase it pre-made), to test students on it, to grade teachers and schools on those tests (which, incidentally, even the makers of those tests decry), if teachers aren't being given access to the materials on which their effectiveness and ultimately their careers depend, not to mention our kids' education, then ALL of us, regardless of profession, should be upset about that IMO.
We just ask teachers to understand theirs is not the only profession which faces multiple challenges and is so critical to our nation's future. We, who are fortunate, choose our careers and dedicate untold amounts of time to them to be successful. When teachers complain (or whine) about the amount of time they must spend on grading papers after the bell rings, or how they are evaluated, or how little they supposedly earn, others just shake their heads and the image of a teacher professional goes down another notch. Many of us would appreciate the opportunity of condensing our annual salary into 10 months and having 2 months to work on various career-related certifications. That additional knowledge improves not just our skills but also our earning potential.
ReplyDeleteSo when you condescendingly suggest others "walk a mile", consider doing so yourself. Perhaps that is also an effort that will help in relating to the students you teach. We all need to acknowledge that each has their own burden to bear.
In so saying, then perhaps *you* might be more considerate of the hurdles teachers face. If "[w]e all need to acknowledge that each has their own burden to bear," then why should teachers have to "suck it up" and NOT raise issues like this when they occur?
DeleteNonsense happens in every profession, and in pretty much every profession there are forums on which people offload, whether online, in the workplace, or in the family. It sounds very cavalier to brush off teachers' concerns when we all have our own burdens to bear, as you put it. The teachers in the article linked have not said that it's only their job that has these issues; it was the commenters above that made it sound as if the teachers were magnifying their concerns to the exclusion of others' professions, but nowhere in the article did I see that - only in the comments section, from non-teachers who are making it about them.